Stories from the edge of explanation.
About 4 min readEach spring, a tube of cloud up to 1,000 kilometres long rolls across the Gulf of Carpentaria at dawn. It looks impossible — but it is a real, well-studied weather phenomenon, not a paranormal event.
About 4 min readLong before Europeans reached Australia, Aboriginal oral traditions told of large, hairy, ape-like beings in the bush. Settlers called them yahoos; today they are known as the Yowie. Reports continue into the present day, but no specimen has ever been found.
About 4 min readOn 17 December 1967, Harold Holt, Australia’s 17th prime minister, went swimming at Cheviot Beach in Victoria — and vanished in front of witnesses. His body was never found, and a coronial inquest in 2005 concluded he had drowned accidentally.
About 4 min readFor centuries, Aboriginal peoples of south-eastern Australia have told of a creature in the billabongs and swamps — a devil of the water that drags the unwary under. European settlers reported it too. The stories may be older than the continent’s last giant marsupials.
About 4 min readOn 6 April 1966, more than 200 students and teachers at two Melbourne schools watched a silver disc descend into a nearby paddock — and then, witnesses say, they were told never to speak of it.