Exmouth, Western Australia
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Exmouth ( , Dhalandji: ''Ningaloo'') is a town on the tip of the
North West Cape North West Cape is a peninsula in the north-west of Western Australia. Cape Range National Park, Cape Range runs down the spine of the peninsula and Ningaloo Reef runs along the western edge. It is in the Gascoyne region and includes the town of ...
and on
Exmouth Gulf Exmouth Gulf is a Bay, gulf in the North West Australia, north-west of Western Australia. It lies between North West Cape and the main coastline of Western Australia. It is considered to be part of the Pilbara Coast and Northwest Shelf, and t ...
in
Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
, north of the state capital
Perth Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...
and southwest of Darwin. The town was established in 1967 to support the nearby United States Naval Communication Station Harold E. Holt. It is named after
Exmouth Gulf Exmouth Gulf is a Bay, gulf in the North West Australia, north-west of Western Australia. It lies between North West Cape and the main coastline of Western Australia. It is considered to be part of the Pilbara Coast and Northwest Shelf, and t ...
. Beginning in the late 1970s, the town began hosting
United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...
personnel assigned to Learmonth Solar Observatory, a defence science facility jointly operated with Australia's Ionospheric Prediction Service. The town is served by
Learmonth Airport Learmonth Airport is an airport, co-located on the site of RAAF Base Learmonth, a Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) base. The airport is located near the town of Exmouth on the north-west coast of Western Australia. Established in the 1940s ...
.


History

In 1618,
Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( ; VOC ), commonly known as the Dutch East India Company, was a chartered company, chartered trading company and one of the first joint-stock companies in the world. Established on 20 March 1602 by the States Ge ...
ship , under command of
Willem Janszoon Willem Janszoon (; ) was a Dutch navigator and colonial governor. He served in the Dutch East Indies in the periods 1603–1611 and 1612–1616, including as governor of Fort Henricus on the island of Solor. During his voyage of 1605–1606 ...
, landed near
North West Cape North West Cape is a peninsula in the north-west of Western Australia. Cape Range National Park, Cape Range runs down the spine of the peninsula and Ningaloo Reef runs along the western edge. It is in the Gascoyne region and includes the town of ...
, just proximate to what would be Exmouth, and named Willem's River, which was later renamed Ashburton River. The location was first used as a military base in
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
. US
Admiral Admiral is one of the highest ranks in many navies. In the Commonwealth nations and the United States, a "full" admiral is equivalent to a "full" general in the army or the air force. Admiral is ranked above vice admiral and below admiral of ...
James F. Calvert in his memoir, '' Silent Running: My Years on a World War II Attack Submarine'', and US Vice Admiral Charles A. Lockwood in ''Sink 'Em All'', his narrative of Allied
submarine warfare Submarine warfare is one of the four divisions of underwater warfare, the others being anti-submarine warfare, Naval mine, mine warfare and Naval mine, mine countermeasures. Submarine warfare consists primarily of Diesel engine, diesel and nu ...
, describe its history. After the retreat from Java in March 1942, Allied naval forces required a forward base for replenishing submarines, then the sole form of offensive warfare against the Japanese. Both
Darwin, Northern Territory Darwin ( Larrakia: ') is the capital city of the Northern Territory, Australia. The city has nearly 53% of the Northern Territory's population, with 139,902 at the 2021 census. It is the smallest, wettest, and most northerly of the Australi ...
, and
Broome, Western Australia Broome, also known as Rubibi by the Yawuru, Yawuru people, is a coastal Pearl hunting, pearling and tourist town in the Kimberley (Western Australia), Kimberley region of Western Australia, north of Perth. The town recorded a population of 14,6 ...
, were too exposed to air attack, so a unmotorized lighter was placed as a refueling barge near the mouth of Exmouth Gulf, where the Allies were already maintaining a
seaplane tender A seaplane tender is a boat or ship that supports the operation of seaplanes. Some of these vessels, known as seaplane carriers, could not only carry seaplanes but also provided all the facilities needed for their operation; these ships are rega ...
. Code-named " Potshot", the spartan base was also developed as a submarine advanced base and rest camp using the tender USS ''Pelias''. An airfield (now
RAAF Learmonth RAAF Base Learmonth, also known as Learmonth Airport , is a joint use Royal Australian Air Force base and civil airport. It is located near the town of Exmouth on the north-west coast of Western Australia. RAAF Base Learmonth is one of the RA ...
) was constructed to provide fighter defense for the base.
Z Special Unit Z Special Unit () was a joint Allied special forces unit formed during the Second World War to operate behind Japanese lines in South East Asia. Predominantly Australian, Z Special Unit was a specialist clandestine operation, direct action, lo ...
used Potshot as a staging base for
Operation Jaywick Operation Jaywick was a special operation undertaken in World War II. In September 1943, 14 commandos and sailors from the Allied Z Special Unit raided Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour, sinking three ships and damaging three ships. B ...
, a raid on Japanese shipping in
Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
Harbour, in September 1943. m In 2009, an emergency landing of the flight Qantas 72 was made at the nearby Learmonth Airport / RAAF Base Learmonth. The
A330 The Airbus A330 is a wide-body airliner developed and produced by Airbus. Airbus began developing larger A300 derivatives in the mid–1970s, giving rise to the A330 twinjet as well as the Airbus A340 quadjet, and launched both designs alon ...
had an incident involving the ADIRU which confused AoA (Angle of Attack) data with altitude data, making the plane think it was in a 16° pitch up when it was flying level. So the protection measures on the plane forced a 16° pitch down twice and brought negative
G-force The g-force or gravitational force equivalent is a Specific force, mass-specific force (force per unit mass), expressed in Unit of measurement, units of standard gravity (symbol ''g'' or ''g''0, not to be confused with "g", the symbol for ...
s on all passengers and it made them float for about 15 seconds. There were no deaths, but 1 crew member and 11 passengers suffered serious injuries.


Tourism

The town relies more on tourism than the station for its existence. At the 2016 census, Exmouth had a population of 2,486. At the height of the tourist season, the population swells to 6,000. Exmouth is popular for diving and snorkelling. Some of the most famous snorkeling spots include Turquoise Bay and Oysters Stacks. The
Cape Range National Park Cape Range National Park is a national park in the Gascoyne region of Western Australia, north of Perth. The park occupies the western side of the North West Cape peninsula over an area of . The nearest town is Exmouth, and directly off the c ...
, which has several gorges, is an area of and its main area is focused on the west coast of the Cape, which provides a large variety of camp sites on the coastal fringe of the park. Yardie Creek and Charles Knife Gorge are land based attractions. On 20 April 2023, Exmouth was in the direct path of a
total solar eclipse A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs approximately every six months, during the eclipse season i ...
, which was the first to be visible in Australia since November 2012. More than 20,000 people watched the eclipse from Exmouth. This cost the State Government of Western Australia in planning and logistics fees.


Big Things

Exmouth is also home to two of
Australia's Big Things The big things of Australia are large structures, some of which are novelty architecture and some sculptures. In Australia, big things have come to be seen as a uniquely Australian phenomenon, although they emerged at the same time as the so-c ...
: The Big Whale Shark (constructed 2002) and The Big Prawn (constructed 2005) both of which were constructed by Brian Paskins. There is an ongoing "Prawn War" between this Big Prawn and the Big Prawn in
Ballina, New South Wales Ballina () is a town in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, Australia, and the seat of the Ballina Shire local government area. It lies north of Sydney and south of Brisbane. Ballina's urban population at the end of 2021 was 46,19 ...
; the Big Prawn in Ballina is larger but Exmouth locals say theirs is much more realistic.


Climate

Exmouth has a hot
semi-arid climate A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of se ...
(
BSh BSH may refer to: * Bacillithiol, a thiol compound found in bacteria * Bahrain Specialist Hospital, a hospital in Bahrain * Bayley Seton Hospital on Staten Island, New York, US * Belarusian Socialist Hramada, a political party * Bishan MRT stati ...
). Temperatures often reach over in summer; however, winters are warm with daytime temperatures around . There is no specific wet and dry season in Exmouth, although rain is most likely to fall between January and July, usually with
monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in Atmosphere of Earth, atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annu ...
al showers and storms from January to April and from the northern edges of
cold front A cold front is the leading edge of a cooler mass of air at ground level that replaces a warmer mass of air and lies within a pronounced surface Trough (meteorology), trough of Low-pressure area, low pressure. It often forms behind an extratropica ...
s in May, June and July. The area occasionally gets caught by tropical cyclones. The period from August to December is usually dry.


Weather events

On 22 March 1999, Tropical Cyclone Vance reached category 5 status as it made landfall near Exmouth. This resulted in the highest wind gust ever reported on the Australian mainland, at Learmonth, to the south. Vance caused significant flooding and property damage. There were no casualties. In April 2014, Exmouth was hit by a massive flash flood, nearly destroying the caravan park and seriously damaging much of the town's infrastructure, causing a severe blow to tourism in the region.


Notes


References


Further reading

* * Western Australia. Ministry for Planning.(1998) ''Exmouth-Learmonth (North West Cape) structure plan''. Perth, W.A. : Western Australian Planning Commission. (The draft Structure Plan for Exmouth-Learmonth (North West Cape) has been prepared by the Ministry for Planning under the guidance and direction of the Gascoyne Coast Planning Coordinating Committee (GCPCC) and the North West Cape Technical Advisory Group)


External links


Exmouth Shire Information
{{Towns Gascoyne WA Shire of Exmouth Coastal towns in Western Australia