The Great Sandy Desert is an interim Australian bioregion,IBRA Version 6.1
data located in the northeast of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

straddling the

Pilbara The Pilbara () is a large, dry, thinly populated region in the north of Western Australia. It is known for its Aboriginal peoples; its ancient landscapes; the red earth; and its vast mineral deposits, in particular iron ore. It is also a glo ...

and southern Kimberley regions and extending east into the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an states and territories of Australia, Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory ...

. It is the second largest desert in Australia after the

Great Victoria Desert The Great Victoria Desert is a sparsely populated desert ecoregion and interim Australian bioregion in Western Australia and South Australia. History In 1875, British-born Australian explorer Ernest Giles became the first European to cros ...

and encompasses an area of . The

Gibson Desert The Gibson Desert is a large desert in Western Australia, largely in an almost "pristine" state. It is about in size, making it the fifth largest desert in Australia, after the Great Victoria, Great Sandy, Tanami and Simpson deserts. The ...

lies to the south and the

Tanami Desert The Tanami Desert is a desert in northern Australia, situated in the Northern Territory and Western Australia. It has a rocky terrain with small hills, and cacti. The Tanami was the Northern Territory's final frontier and was not fully explored b ...

lies to the east of the Great Sandy Desert.

Features

The Great Sandy Desert contains large

ergs The erg is a unit of energy equal to 10−7joules (100 nJ). It originated in the Centimetre–gram–second system of units (CGS). It has the symbol ''erg''. The erg is not an SI unit. Its name is derived from (), a Greek word meaning 'work' o ...

, often consisting of longitudinal

dune A dune is a landform composed of wind- or water-driven sand. It typically takes the form of a mound, ridge, or hill. An area with dunes is called a dune system or a dune complex. A large dune complex is called a dune field, while broad, f ...

s. In the north east of the desert there is a meteorite impact crater, the Wolfe Creek crater.

Population

The region is sparsely populated. The main populations consist of

indigenous Australian Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...

communities and mining centres. The aboriginal people of the desert fall into two main groups, the Martu in the west and the

Pintupi The Pintupi are an Australian Aboriginal group who are part of the Western Desert cultural group and whose traditional land is in the area west of Lake Macdonald and Lake Mackay in Western Australia. These people moved (or were moved) into the ...

in the east. Linguistically, they are speakers of multiple Western Desert languages. Many of these indigenous people were forcibly removed from their lands during the late 18th, 19th, and the early 20th centuries, to be relocated to other settlements, such as

Papunya Papunya ( Pintupi-Luritja: ''Warumpi'') is a small Indigenous Australian community roughly northwest of Alice Springs (Mparntwe) in the Northern Territory, Australia. It is known as an important centre for Contemporary Indigenous Australian art ...

in the Northern Territory. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, some of the original inhabitants returned. Young indigenous adults, from the Great Sandy Desert region, travel to and work in the Wilurarra Creative programs to maintain and develop their culture, and a greater sense of community.Wilurarra Creative
/ref>

Climate

Rainfall is low throughout the coast and, especially further north, is strongly seasonal. Areas near the Kimberley have an average rainfall that exceeds , but can be patchy. Many dry years end with a monsoon cloud mass or a

tropical cyclone A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system characterized by a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Depend ...

. Like many of Australia's deserts, precipitation is high by

desert A desert is a barren area of landscape where little precipitation occurs and, consequently, living conditions are hostile for plant and animal life. The lack of vegetation exposes the unprotected surface of the ground to denudation. About on ...

standards, but with the driest regions recording total rainfall a little below . The heat of Australia’s ground surface, in turn, creates a massive evaporation cycle, which partially explains the higher-than-normal desert rainfall. This region is one which gives rise to the heat lows, which help drive the NW monsoon. Almost all the rain regionally comes from monsoon thunderstorms, or the occasional tropical cyclone rain depression. Annually, for most of the area, there are about 20–30 days where thunderstorms form. However, in the north and bordering the Kimberley, 30-40 per year is the average. Summer daytime temperatures are some of the hottest in Australia. Regions further south average , except when monsoonal cloud cover is active. Several people have died in this region during seasonal flooding, after their vehicles were stuck or broken down on remote dirt roads. Conversely, a few travellers have had their vehicles malfunction during the hottest times of the year, with dehydration, sun exposure and heatstroke being the predominant causes of death. Winters are short and warm; temperatures range from . Frost does not occur in most of the area. The regions bordering the Gibson Desert in the far southeast may record a light frost or two every year. Away from the coast winter nights can still be chilly in comparison to the warm days.

Economy

Indigenous art Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention * Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band * Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehor ...

is a huge industry in central Australia. Mines, most importantly the Telfer Gold Mine and Nifty Copper Mine, and cattle stations are found in the far west. Telfer is one of the largest gold mines in Australia. The undeveloped

Kintyre uranium deposit The Kintyre uranium project is located 60 km south of the Telfer gold mine and 260 km northeast of Newman at the western edge of the Great Sandy Desert in the East Pilbara region of Western Australia. History Uranium was discovered ...

lies south of Telfer.

Fauna and flora

The vegetation of the Great Sandy Desert is dominated by spinifex. Animals in the region include feral camels,

dingo The dingo (''Canis familiaris'', ''Canis familiaris dingo'', ''Canis dingo'', or ''Canis lupus dingo'') is an ancient (Basal (phylogenetics), basal) lineage of dog found in Australia (continent), Australia. Its taxonomic classification is de ...

es,

goanna A goanna is any one of several species of lizards of the genus '' Varanus'' found in Australia and Southeast Asia. Around 70 species of ''Varanus'' are known, 25 of which are found in Australia. This varied group of carnivorous reptiles ranges ...

s (including the large

perentie The perentie (''Varanus giganteus'') is the largest monitor lizard or goanna native to Australia. It is one of the largest living lizards on earth, after the Komodo dragon, Asian water monitor, crocodile monitor, and intersecting by size with ...

) and numerous species of lizards and birds. Other animal inhabitants include bilbies,

mulgara Mulgaras are the two small rat-sized species in the genus ''Dasycercus''. They are marsupial carnivores, closely related to the Tasmanian devil and the quolls, that live in deserts and spinifex grasslands of arid Australia. They are nocturnal, ...

marsupial mole Marsupial moles, the Notoryctidae , are highly specialized marsupial mammals, known from two species found at the Australian interior. * ''Notoryctes typhlops'' (southern marsupial mole, known as the ''itjaritjari'' by the Pitjantjatjara and Yan ...

s, rufous hare-wallabies,

thorny devil The thorny devil (''Moloch horridus''), also known commonly as the mountain devil, thorny lizard, thorny dragon, and moloch, is a species of lizard in the family Agamidae. The species is endemic to Australia. It is the sole species in the ...

bearded dragon ''Pogona'' is a genus of reptiles containing six lizard species which are often known by the common name bearded dragons. The name "bearded dragon" refers to the underside of the throat (or "beard") of the lizard, which can turn black and gain we ...

s, and

red kangaroo The red kangaroo (''Osphranter rufus'') is the largest of all kangaroos, the largest terrestrial mammal native to Australia, and the largest extant marsupial. It is found across mainland Australia, except for the more fertile areas, such as sou ...

s. Some of the bird-life found within the desert include the rare Alexandra's parrot, the mulga parrot and the scarlet-chested parrot.

References

External links

{{Coord, 20, S, 125, E, source:dewiki_region:AU-WA_scale:5000000_type:landmark, display=title Biogeography of the Northern Territory Biogeography of Western Australia Deserts of the Northern Territory Deserts of Western Australia Ergs Pilbara Canning Stock Route Kimberley (Western Australia)