January • 1 January –
Bushfires grip parts of the
Central Coast and the
Riverina in
New South Wales and the
Wimmera in
Victoria after one of the hottest New Years Days on record, with the
Sydney central business district reaching 45 °C (113 °F). • 2 January – A skydiving plane crash near
Willowbank in Queensland claims five lives. • 9 January – Communities in the
Pilbara region of Western Australia are evacuated due to
Cyclone Clare. • 10 January – Six Australians die when a bus flips over in
Egypt. • 16 January –
Premier of Western Australia Geoff Gallop resigns, citing clinical depression as the reason. • 22–29 January – Bushfires affect several towns in Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia and
Tasmania. Three volunteer
firefighters are killed. • 24 January –
Alan Carpenter replaces Gallop as Premier of Western Australia.
February • 18 February – Six teenagers are killed and another is injured in a
hit and run accident in
Cardross, Victoria, near
Mildura.
March • 5 March -
Sydney FC win the inaugural
A-League Grand Final, beating
Central Coast Mariners 1–0. • 18 March –
South Australia and
Tasmania vote in parliamentary state elections. Both the
Mike Rann and
Paul Lennon governments are re-elected. • 20 March –
Tropical Cyclone Larry strikes
Innisfail and
Cairns in
Far North Queensland. Despite hundreds of millions of
dollars in damage, no-one is killed. • 23 March –
Microsoft releases the
Xbox 360 games console in Australia. • 27 March – The
WorkChoices industrial relations reforms come into effect.
April • 7 April –
John Landy retires as
Governor of Victoria, and is succeeded by
David de Kretser. • 18 April – More than 19
Australian Federal Police officers are injured as the capital of the
Solomon Islands,
Honiara, erupts into rioting. In response to this, the
Prime Minister of Australia John Howard orders an
Army deployment of 220 troops. • 21 April – Private
Jacob Kovco becomes the first casualty of Australia's involvement in the
Iraq campaign. The reason given initially was that his gun had
accidentally discharged while cleaning his gun, although this was later retracted. It was later stated that he had accidentally shot himself while skylarking with his pistol. • 25 April – A small
earthquake causes
a rock fall in a
gold mine in
Beaconsfield, Tasmania. Eleven miners come out, but three are left inside. One of them is found dead on 28 April. The other two are freed on 9 May. • 26 April – The body of
Bosnian civilian contractor Juso Sinanovic is taken to Australia instead of the body of Private Kovco. Private Kovco's body later arrived in Australia on 29 April.
May • 16 May –
Bill Stefaniak topples
Brendan Smyth as leader of the ACT Liberal Party. • 25 May – Australian troops are redeployed to
East Timor after fresh outbreaks of violence.
June • 2 June – The A$1.4 billion sale of the
Myer department store chain to
Newbridge Capital and the
Myer family is completed. • 12 June - Australia's national football team, the
Socceroos, play their first
FIFA World Cup match in 32 years against
Japan. The match ended in a historic 3–1 victory to Australia, courtesy of late comeback goals by
Tim Cahill and
John Aloisi. The match is considered one of Australia's finest sporting achievements, and was responsible for the emergence of the
Australia-Japan football rivalry. • 18 June -
Brazil beats Australia 2–0 in
Munich. • 22 June - Australia drew with
Croatia 2–2 in
Stuttgart to progress to the Round of 16 for the first time in their World Cup history. • 26 June - Australia's FIFA World Cup campaign ended with a 1–0 lost to
Italy in
Kaiserslautern thanks to a controversial
Totti penalty-kick.
July • 9 July – Revelations are published in
News Limited newspapers that, in 1994, John Howard made a secret deal with
Peter Costello to hand over the leadership of the
Liberal Party to him after having served two terms in office as Prime Minister. • 17 July - Australia's largest recorded inundation caused by a
tsunami hits the Western Australian coast at
Steep Point. • 29 July – In the face of a worsening water supply crisis, a
referendum is held in
Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia's second largest inland city, on the issue of using water recycled from the city's sewerage as a source of drinking water. The acrimonious campaign and emotional debate were watched closely nationwide as most other Australian cities raise water restrictions in the face of record low dam and river levels.
August • 8 August – night.
September • 4 September –
Steve Irwin dies in an accident when he is struck in the heart by a
stingray barb off Queensland's coast. • 8 September –
Peter Brock is killed in a smash when his rally car skids off a bend and hits a tree. • 9 September –
Peter Beattie is re-elected Queensland premier at an early state election. • 26 September – Seven people are killed in a horror road smash outside the
Victoria town of
Donald.
October • After some of the hottest October days on record, bushfires ravage parts of
New South Wales,
Victoria and
Tasmania. • 18 October –
Linda Lavarch resigns as Queensland's
Attorney-General to seek treatment for depression, after it is revealed she refused a deal to return
Jayant Patel (dubbed "Dr Death" by the media) to Australia to face criminal charges. • 20 October –
Rupert Murdoch's
News Corporation company buys a 7.5 per cent stake in its main competitor,
John Fairfax Holdings (publisher of the
Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and the
Australian Financial Review). • 25 October –
New South Wales Police minister
Carl Scully is sacked after it is shown that he had misled
parliament on two occasions about the
2005 Cronulla riots. • 25 October – Comments that
Sheikh Taj El-Din Hilaly made about women who dressed immodestly being responsible for rape are made public in
The Australian. The sheik is forced to retract such comments on 26 October.
November • 11 November –
Belinda Emmett, a TV personality and wife of
Rove McManus, dies, after a battle with breast cancer. • 22 November – Sydney is covered in smoke after raging fires in the
Blue Mountains. • 25 November –
Steve Bracks is re-elected Victorian premier at the state election. • 29 November – One
SAS soldier and the helicopter captain are dead and eight more rescued when a
Blackhawk helicopter hits the deck of
HMAS Kanimbla and crashes into waters off the coast of
Fiji. • 30 November –
Greg Page, the founding member and lead singer of Australia's famous children's band
The Wiggles, announced his retirement due to
orthostatic intolerance. He handed his yellow skivvy to
Sam Moran.
December • 4 December –
Kevin Rudd and
Julia Gillard successfully challenge
Kim Beazley and
Jenny Macklin in a caucus ballot for leadership and deputy leadership of the
Australian Labor Party. • 18 December – 16-year-old girl
Stacey Mitchell is murdered by lesbian couple Jessica Stasinowsky and Valerie Parashumti. She was bludgeoned with a concrete block and strangled with a chain, with her corpse found in a wheelie bin. • The
Gippsland region of
Victoria and Eastern
Tasmania come under threat as a result of
bushfires.
Non-specific dates • Investigation into
AWB Limited's role in the
Oil-for-Food Programme, sometimes referred to as
Wheatgate or
Oil for wheat. The official inquiry states that AWB directors did know about the kickback payments as early as 2001 and that government ministers did not know about the kickbacks, although this was not in their brief. ==Arts and literature==