Macquarie Island

About Macquarie Island:

• It is located around 1,500 km southeast of Tasmania, Australia, in the Pacific Ocean.
• It is located about halfway between Australia and Antarctica.
• The island is about 34 kilometers (21 miles) long and 5 kilometers (3 miles) wide.
• No people live there permanently
• The island is the exposed crest of the undersea Macquarie Ridge, raised to its present position where the Indo-Australian tectonic plate meets the Pacific plate.
• It is a site of major geoconservation significance, being the only place on earth where rocks from the earth’s mantle (6 km below the ocean floor) are being actively exposed above sea level.
• Macquarie Ridge is one of only 3 such ridges that impede the Antarctic Circumpolar Circulation.
• This results in distinct differences between the west and east sides of the ridge, which are used in different ways by different species.
• Although the island is treeless, there are a variety of native vegetation types, including grasses and many species of moss.
• There are a few small glacial lakes.
• Fauna: It is home to 4 species of penguins and 4 species of albatross, the island recorded 57 seabird species.
• Regionally part of Oceania and politically a part of Tasmania, Australia, since 1900, it became a Tasmanian State Reserve in 1978 and was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.