Portal:Queensland

The Queensland Portal

Queensland (locally /ˈkwiːnzlænd/ KWEENZ-land, commonly abbreviated as QLD or 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 bounded 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...)

Selected Article

Submerged Ipswich railway line in the suburb of Gailes

The 2010–2011 Queensland floods were a series of floods hit Australia, beginning in December 2010, primarily in the state of Queensland including its capital city, Brisbane. The floods forced the evacuation of thousands of people from towns and cities. At least 70 towns and over 200,000 people were affected. Damage initially was estimated at around A$1 billion. The estimated reduction in Australia's GDP is about A$30 billion.

Three-quarters of the state of Queensland was declared a disaster zone. The 2010–2011 floods killed 35 people in Queensland. As of 26 January, an additional nine persons are missing. The Queensland floods were followed by the 2011 Victorian floods which saw more than 50 communities in western and central Victoria also grapple with significant flooding.

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

Selected business

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 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?
... 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?