Major historic landslides
On 30 July 1997, a large section of steep mountainside below the Alpine Way, immediately above part of Thredbo Village collapsed. About 1,000 tonne of earth, rock and trees slid rapidly down the steep slope, shearing the Carinya Lodge off its foundations, and carrying it on to the Bimbadeen Lodge at high speed. Both multi-level buildings were destroyed and the resulting debris, together with several cars, was scattered over and buried in the lower 250 metres of the 400 metre landslide. Rescue efforts were hampered by several further minor 'slides' and the unstable mass of earth and rock, debris from the destroyed lodges, trees and vehicles. Eighteen people died, but one injured man was rescued successfully after being entombed for 65 hours.
On 27 September 1996, a 14 metre high limestone sea-cliff collapsed on spectators at a school surf carnival at Cowaramup Bay near Gracetown in the Margaret River region. The spectators had been sheltering from rain under an overhang when about 30 tonne of rock and sand fell. Five adults and four children were killed and another three people were injured. One survivor, a 10 year old girl, was dug out from beneath the rubble by the emergency workers after being trapped for 90 minutes. She received relatively minor injuries.
On 30 April 1988, in Coledale, a small coal mining town near Wollongong, a landslide resulted from a combination of human interference and two weeks of heavy rainfall. A 20 metre high railway embankment collapsed after earth and rock ballast used to fill an old mine dam became saturated resulting in severe undermining and subsidence. A sudden rush of mud and rock smashed into a house below, turning it through a 60 degree angle before demolishing. The occupants a young mother and her baby son, were killed. Source: Emergency Management Australia
Two adjacent landslides destroyed a total of 35 houses during the period 1956 to 1970 in the most extensive case of building destruction by landslides in Australia. The slips currently measure seven to eight metres deep and are moving very slowly in wet sand and clays, despite attempts to stop the movement. Special legislation was enacted to provide partial compensation to the owners of the houses and the land has been reverted to the Council jurisdiction and dedicated as a public park. Source: Emergency Management Australia
On 12 January 1951, a deluge of about 700 millimetres of rain in just under five hours triggered debris flows over 10 kilometres of the Captain Cook Highway behind Ellis Beach, north of Cairns. Huge quantities of debris were swept from the mountainside onto the road and over a precipice into the sea. According to contemporary reports in the Cairns Post, boulders up to three metres long were ’hurled into the Pacific as if they were marbles’. Large slabs of the bitumen road surface were tilted and landslide debris was piled up to three metres deep, closing the highway to normal traffic for at least two weeks. Source: Emergency Management Australia
On 31 January 1928, an embankment on the railway line between Blackwood and Belair collapsed while a tunnel was being demolished in preparation for duplication of the line. Six men were killed and two injured. The landslide was thought to have been caused by heavy rain and traffic vibrations. Source: Emergency Management Australia
Late at night on Tuesday 4 June 1872, after about 24 hours of heavy rain, a large landslide took place on the steep northern slope of Mt Arthur. The slide incorporating a huge volume of floodwater, boulders, broken trees, sediment and other debris, was channelled rapidly down Humphrey Rivulet and disgorged onto the plains of what is now the city of Glenorchy. A number of houses and farms were damaged or destroyed. No lives were lost in the incident, but one person had been drowned during the floods which occurred on the preceding afternoon.