Portal:Queensland

The Queensland Portal

Queensland (locally /ˈkwiːnzlænd/ KWEENZ-land, commonly abbreviated as QLD) is a state in northeastern Australia, the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south, respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and the Pacific Ocean; to the state's north is the Torres Strait, separating the Australian mainland from Papua New Guinea, and the Gulf of Carpentaria to the north-west. With an area of 1,723,030 square kilometres (665,270 sq mi), Queensland is the world's sixth-largest subdivision of any country on earth; it is larger than all but 16 countries. Due to its size, Queensland's geographical features and climates are diverse, and include tropical rainforests, rivers, coral reefs, mountain ranges and white sandy beaches in its tropical and sub-tropical coastal regions, as well as deserts and savanna in the semi-arid and desert climatic regions of its interior.

Queensland has a population of over 5.5 million, concentrated in South East Queensland, where nearly three in four reside. The capital and largest city in the state is Brisbane, Australia's third-largest city and comprising fully half of the state's population. Ten of Australia's thirty largest cities are located in Queensland, the largest outside Brisbane being the Gold Coast, the Sunshine Coast, Townsville, Cairns, Ipswich, and Toowoomba. 24.2% of the state's population were born overseas. The state has the highest inter-state net migration in Australia. (Full article...)

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Palm Island, also known by the Aboriginal name Bukaman, is a tropical island with a resident community of about 2,000 people. The settlement is named variously Palm Island, the Mission, Palm Island Settlement or Palm Community. The island is situated 65 kilometres north-west of Townsville, on the east coast of Queensland, Australia 800 kilometres north of the Tropic of Capricorn. It is the main island of the Greater Palm group, and consists of small bays, sandy beaches and steep forested mountains rising to a peak of 548 metres. Neighbouring islands outside the Palm group include Rattlesnake Island and Magnetic Island.

Palm Island is often termed a classic "tropical paradise" given its natural endowments, but it has had a troubled history since the European settlement of Australia. For much of the twentieth century it was used by the Queensland Government as a settlement for Aboriginals considered guilty of such infractions as being "disruptive", being pregnant to a white man or being born with "mixed blood".

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Image 1The peninsula of Seventeen Seventy, Queensland, where Captain Cook landed in 1770 (from Queensland)
Image 2The Mossman River, flowing through the Daintree Rainforest in Far North Queensland (from Queensland)
Image 3Cargo ships at the Port of Gladstone, Queensland's largest commodity seaport (from Queensland)
Image 4The Great Barrier Reef, which extends along most of Queensland's Coral Sea coastline (from Queensland)
Image 5Commonly designated regions of Queensland, with Central Queensland divided into Mackay and Fitzroy subregions (from Queensland)
Image 6The McPherson Range at Lamington National Park in South East Queensland (from Queensland)
Image 7Fighting between Burke and Wills's supply party and Aboriginal Australians at Bulla in 1861 (from Queensland)
Image 8Returned World War II soldiers march in Queen Street, Brisbane, 1944 (from Queensland)
Image 9Gold mine at Ravenswood in North Queensland. Mining is one of the state's major industries (from Queensland)
Image 10Queen Elizabeth II Courts of Law, headquarters of the Supreme Court of Queensland and District Court of Queensland (from Queensland)
Image 11Noosa Heads on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland's third largest city and a major tourist destination (from Queensland)
Image 12The Great Court at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Queensland's oldest university (from Queensland)
Image 13Lake McKensie, K'gari (Fraser Island) (from Queensland)
Image 14Sheep shearers and farm hands at Jondaryan Woolshed, c. 1872 (from Queensland)
Image 15Passenger train at Oxley railway station on the Ipswich/Rosewood line within the Queensland Rail City network (from Queensland)
Image 16Kanaka workers in a sugar cane plantation, late 19th century (from Queensland)
Image 17Government House, seat of the Governor (from Queensland)
Image 18Skyline of the Brisbane central business district. Brisbane is a global city and the state's largest economic hub. (from Queensland)
Image 19Cricket game at The Gabba, a 42,000-seat round stadium in Brisbane (from Queensland)
Image 20Captain James Cook claims the east coast of Australia for the Kingdom of Great Britain at Possession Island in 1770 (from Queensland)
Image 21The Ekka (the Royal Queensland Exhibition) is held each August at the Brisbane Showgrounds. (from Queensland)
Image 22The Gold Coast, Queensland's second-largest city and a major tourist destination (from Queensland)
Image 23Parliament House, seat of the Queensland Parliament (from Queensland)
Image 24Hill Inlet at the Whitsunday Islands. (from Queensland)
Image 25Köppen climate types in Queensland (from Queensland)
Image 26Brisbane, capital and most populous city of Queensland (from Queensland)
Image 27Blackbirded South Sea Islanders on a Sugarcane plantation in Queensland. (from Queensland)
Image 28Parade of troops in Brisbane, prior to departure for the Boer War in South Africa (from Queensland)
Image 29Queen Elizabeth II visited Brisbane in October 1982 for the Commonwealth Games (from Queensland)
Image 30Aftermath of the 1861 Cullin-La-Ringo massacre in which 19 settlers were killed by Aboriginal people, the deadliest attack on settlers in the frontier wars (from Queensland)

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Storm Financial Limited was a financial advice company, based in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The company was founded by Emmanual Cassimatis and his wife Julie Cassimatis in 2004. On 12 December 2008, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission began investigation of Storm Financial's margin lending and related advice.

It went into administration in January 2009 and was placed in liquidation on 26 March 2009. The company had A$88 million in debts at the time. The collapse came at a time when an estimated 2,000 to 4,000 investors had suffered the effects of the financial crisis, and were facing significant losses. This left any investors who felt that had been misled or misguided with limited financial recourse against the company. (Full article...)

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Did you know (auto-generated)

... that Lachlan Murdoch was forced to resign as a director of Prime Media Group because the company owned a radio station on Queensland's Sunshine Coast?
... that in its two years of existence, the Hunter River Railway Company initiated construction on what would eventually become the Great Northern Railway connecting Sydney to Queensland?

More did You Know?

...that Innisfail (pictured) was once named Geraldton but in 1910 was renamed to avoid confusion with the town of the same name in Western Australia?
...that the BuzzSaw SkyLoop roller coaster features the tallest inversion in the Southern Hemisphere and the second highest inversion worldwide of its type?
...that the clock in the South Brisbane Town Hall, installed in 1904, was the first electrically-driven clock in Australia?
...that LGBT rights in Queensland were advanced when civil partnerships became legal for same-sex couples from 23 February 2012?