McDonald Islands 1 dollar 2014

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14.00


McDonald Island is part of the archipelago of The Heard Island and McDonald Islands, an Australian external territory and volcanic group of barren Antarctic islands, about two-thirds of the way from Madagascar to Antarctica. The group's overall size is 372 square kilometres in area and it has 101.9 km of coastline. Discovered in the mid-19th century, they have been territories of Australia since 1947, when they were transferred from the U.K.,  and contain the only two active volcanoes in Australian territory, the summit of one of which, Mawson Peak, is higher than any mountain on the Australian mainland. They lie on the Kerguelen Plateau in the Indian Ocean.

The islands are among the most remote places on Earth: They are located approximately 4,099 km southwest of Perth, Western Australia, 3,845 km southwest of Cape Leeuwin, Australia, 4,200 km southeast of South Africa, 3,830 km southeast of Madagascar, 1,630 km north of Antarctica, and 450 km southeast of Kerguelen. The islands are currently uninhabited.

Neither island-cluster had recorded visitors until the mid-1850s. Peter Kemp, a British sailor, may have become the first person to have seen the island. On 27 November 1833, he spotted it from the brig Magnet during a voyage from Kerguelen to the Antarctic and was believed to have entered the island on his 1833 chart.

An American sailor, Captain John Heard, on the ship Oriental, sighted Heard Island on 25 November 1853, en route from Boston to Melbourne. He reported the discovery one month later and had the island named after him. Captain William McDonald aboard the Samarang discovered the nearby McDonald Islands six weeks later, on 4 January 1854.

The islands are a territory of Australia administered by the Australian Antarctic Division of the Australian Department of the Environment and Water Resources. They are populated by large numbers of seal, penguins, and bird species. The islands are contained within a 65,000-square-kilometre marine reserve and are primarily visited for research. There is no permanent human habitation. With no population, there is no indigenous economic activity. The islands' only natural resource is fish; the Australian government allows limited fishing in the surrounding waters.

This is the first coin ever produced for the McDonald Island.

 

Additional product information

Year 2,014
Condition UNC
Denomination 1 dollar
Diámeter (mm) 39

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