The Australian Desert Fireball Network: overview and recent results

<p>The Desert Fireball Network is a fireball observing network which stretches across the southern part of the Australian continent. To date, it has over 50 cameras, covering an area of approximately 2.5m km2. Its purpose is to observe and triangulate fireballs, calculate trajectories for incoming meteorites. The camera network has been operational in digital form since 2012, and to date as captured approximately 1.5PTB of data, primarily all sky images. We present an overview of the DFN results to date, detailing the dataset of approximately 1500 orbits, and over 30 possible candidate meteorite falls, and describe the most recent results. In particular, the team have recently recovered two candidate meteorites; one from the Nullarbor and one from the Simpson Desert in South Australia. The comparison the stories of these recoveries illustrate the typical issues of searching meteorite searching, and of verifying the meteorite’s provenance, and possible origin of the rocks is interesting to compare.</p>

Cosmolian: High-resolution Integrated OSL and CN modelling Program for Sand Transportation in Eolian Realms (HIPSTER)

<p>The extensivity of sand dunes in continental interiors makes the understating of their morphodynamical properties valuable for palaeoenvironmental reconstructions and the interpretation of landscape evolution. Nevertheless, the study of aeolian landscape development at the million-years timescale is hampered by the complex interaction of factors determining dune migration and the inherently self-destructive nature of their chronostratigraphy, thus limiting the applicability of traditional luminescence-based dating methods for configuring processes beyond ~300 Ka. In this study, we present a standalone program that simulates aeolian transport based on luminescence-derived chronologies coupled with numerical modelling of cosmogenic nuclides accumulation. This integrative approach reveals ancient phases of sand irruption and provides a data-based scheme facilitating the morphodynamical study of aeolian processes over multiple timescales. We present a case study of the program application by analyzing data from the Australian Simpson Desert, unfolding several phases of aeolian vitality since the late Pliocene. The synchronicity of the results with drastic changes in environmental settings exemplifies the applicability of process-based modelling in constructing a timeframe of key landscape evolution events in arid environments by studying aeolian landforms. Finally, the relationships between model parameters used to determine environmental settings on sand migration patterns make the program a powerful tool to further investigating triggers and mechanisms of aeolian processes.</p>

The lost oasis: Archaeology of a ‘forgotten’ mikiri well in the Simpson Desert

This paper describes a previously unknown mikiri well in the Simpson dune field. This site was abandoned about 500-600 years ago and does not feature in ethnographic records for this region. We argue that its abandonment was most likely due to failure of the well caused by a fall in the local watertable. The Simpson Desert is one of the major sand-ridge deserts of the world, but current views of the chronology of human use of this vast dune field rest on only a handful of radiocarbon ages (n=12). The radiocarbon ages for this mikiri, and its surroundings, add to this limited dataset. We plot all available radiocarbon ages from archaeological sites in the dune field showing that occupation of this mikiri coincided with a widespread increase in use of the dune field during the last millennium, at about the time the Wangkanguru people in the dune field were becoming linguistically distinct from the Arabana to the west.

Intensive and extensive movements of feral camels in central Australia

A better understanding of the movement of feral dromedary camels (Camelus dromedarius) in Australia would be useful for planning removal operations (harvest or culling), because the pattern and scale of camel movement relates to the period they reside in a given area, and thus the search effort, timing and frequency of removal operations. From our results, we suspect that the dune direction influences how camels move across central Australia; particularly effects like the north–south longitudinal dune systems in the Simpson Desert, which appeared to elongate camel movement in the same direction as the dunes. We called this movement anisotropy. Research suggests camel movement in Australia is not migratory but partially cyclic, with two distinctive movement patterns. Our study investigated this further by using satellite tracking data from 54 camels in central Australia, recorded between 2007 and 2016. The mean tracking period for each animal was 363.9 days (s.e.m.=44.1 days). We used a method labelled multi-scale partitioning to test for changes in movement behaviour and partitioned more localised intensive movements within utilisation areas, from larger-scale movement, called ranging. This involved analysing the proximity of movement trajectories to other nearby trajectories of the same animal over time. We also used Dynamic Brownian Bridges Movement Models, which consider the relationship of consecutive locations to determine the areas of utilisation. The mean utilisation area and duration of a camel (n=658 areas) was found to be 342.6km2 (s.e.m.=33.2km2) over 23.5 days (s.e.m.=1.6 days), and the mean ranging distance (n=611 ranging paths) was a 45.1km (s.e.m.=2.0km) path over 3.1 days (s.e.m.=0.1 days).

Frontier mystery: An unusual mound of kopi mourning caps on the eastern edge of the Simpson Desert

On the eastern edge of the Simpson dune field, an unusual find of 40–60 mourning caps in a single cluster, prompts us to raise issues about its interpretation. This region is known for violence along the colonial frontier, and this kopi site is only one to two days walk from the site of a known massacre of a ceremonial gathering of people at Kaliduwarry waterhole in about 1878. There is no direct evidence showing that this site coincides with colonial expansion in this region in the late 1870s, but the condition of these caps and their geomorphic context indicate that this site cannot be older than a few hundred years. If it dates to the pre-contact period in the 1800s, this kopi site must reflect a higher degree of social ranking and complexity than is usually assumed in the ethnography. Whether or not this remarkable site relates to the death of a single, high-ranked individual or multiple deaths on the colonial frontier in a single event, this cluster of mourning caps indicates that 40–60 people were in mourning simultaneously.

Sailing into Australian Settler Fictions: Reflection on an Inquiry and Construction with Performance and Images

This is reflection on artistic inquiry as an expedition, construction and modification of a watercraft, where image-making occurs en route. The journey is from the Queensland Gold Coast to the fringes of the Simpson Desert, undertaken in May-June 2018. The place of boats in Australian inland exploration is considered. The author-artist situates performance/art-making as a post-structural practice. Research or inquiry is seen partly as a self-realization occurring after the process has already begun. The origins of the craft and the expedition are also described. From the images the artist imagines the search for Burke and Wills, the lost explorers, as it might be conducted by boat. Encounters with ‘Grey Nomads’ are considered. An inland sea is discovered, and the existence of the Peoples Republic of Wangkangurra imaginatively arises in the vacated fringes of the Simpson Desert. Key images of the emergent inquiry are provided and discussed. Discoveries and disruptions of settler fictions are made, concluding on the value of the approach in challenging cultural authorities.