Hail Creek is a rural

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality, a historical named location or place in Canada * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localitie ...

in the

Isaac Region The Isaac Region is a local government area located in Central Queensland, Queensland, Australia created in March 2008 as a result of the report of the Local Government Reform Commission released in July 2007. In the , the Isaac Region had a po ...

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. In the , Hail Creek had a population of 179 people.

Geography

The

Hail Creek coal mine The Hail Creek Coal Mine is a coal mine located within the Bowen Basin at Hail Creek in the Isaac Region, Central Queensland, Australia. The mine has coal reserves amounting to 970 million tonnes of coking coal, one of the largest coal reserves ...

is within the locality (). It is operated by

Glencore Australia Glencore plc is an Anglo-Swiss multinational commodity trading and mining company with headquarters in Baar, Switzerland. Glencore's oil and gas headquarters are in London, England as well as its primary listing being on the London Stock Exc ...

. The Suttor Developmental Road (State Route 11) runs through from the south-east ( Nebo) to the south-west ( Kemmis). The Hail Creek branch of the

Goonyella railway line The Goonyella railway system is located in Central Queensland, Australia. It services the coal mining area of the Bowen Basin, carrying coal to the Hay Point and Dalrymple Bay Coal Terminals 20 km southeast of Mackay, as well as product ...

enters the locality from the south-west (Kemmis) and terminates at the Hail Creek railway station on a balloon loop at the Hail Creek coal mine (). The Hail Creek Mine also has a heliport to the north-west of the railway station (). Hail Creek Mine is an heliport (). The locality contains the following mountains (from north to south): * Bon Hill () * Mount Cona () * Mount Andrew () * Mount Robert () * Mount Cristoe () * The Peak () The Homevale National Park is in the north-east of the locality extending into neighbouring Mount Britton (). The national park features cliffs and peaks in a vast dry landscape. There are a number of important

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

sites. Apart from the national park and the coal mine, the land use is predominantly

grazing In agriculture, grazing is a method of animal husbandry whereby domestic livestock are allowed outdoors to free range (roam around) and consume wild vegetations in order to feed conversion ratio, convert the otherwise indigestible (by human diges ...

on native vegetation with a small amount of crop growing in the east of the locality around Oaky Creek.

History

Hard

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

formations were created by a series of

volcanic eruptions A volcanic eruption occurs when material is expelled from a volcanic vent or fissure. Several types of volcanic eruptions have been distinguished by volcanologists. These are often named after famous volcanoes where that type of behavior h ...

30 million years ago which covered older

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanite, aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the planetary surface, surface of a terrestrial ...

rocks with

lava Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a Natural satellite, moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a Fissure vent, fractu ...

. As the basalt erodes more easily, the remaining formations are visually dramatic. Fossils found in the area have been dated back to the

Permian period The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years, from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.902 Mya. It is the s ...

between 280-225 million years ago. Homevale National Park was previously the Homevale pastoral station where cattle were grazed. Te national park was gazetted in 1995 under the

Nature Conservation Act 1992 The ''Nature Conservation Act 1992'' is an act of the Parliament of Queensland, Australia, that, together with subordinate legislation, provides for the legislative protection of Queensland's threatened biota. As originally published, it prov ...

by regulation, Nature Conservation (Protected Areas) Amendment (No.5) 1995. Its area was extended in 1996, 2009, and 2024. As at 2024, the homestead of the Homevale pastoral station remains within the national park on Homevale Homestead Road () and conservation plans are to be developed for it.

Demographics

In the , Hail Creek had a population of 148 people. In the , Hail Creek had a population of 179 people.

Economy

Apart from the mine, the locality has a number of homesteads (from north to south): * Exevale () * Carrinyah () * Fort Cooper () with its airstrip ().

Education

There are no schools in Hail Creek. The nearest government primary schools are Nebo State School in neighbouring Nebo to the south-east, Glenden State School in neighbouring Glenden to the west, and Eungella State School in Eungella to the north. The nearest government secondary school is Glenden State School (to Year 12), but some parts of Hail Creek would be too distant from this school and other options would be

distance education Distance education, also known as distance learning, is the education of students who may not always be physically present at school, or where the learner and the teacher are separated in both time and distance; today, it usually involves online ...

and boarding school.

References

{{Isaac Region Isaac Region Localities in Queensland