Great Victoria Desert
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The Great Victoria Desert is a barren, arid and sparsely populated desert ecoregion in southern Australia. It falls inside the states of South Australia and Western Australia and consists of many small sandhills, grasslands and salt lakes. It is over 700 kilometres (435 miles) wide (from west to east) and covers and area of 424,400 square kilometers (163,900 square miles). The Western Australia Mallee shrub ecoregion lies to the west, the Little Sandy Desert to the northwest, the Gibson Desert and the Central Ranges xeric shrublands to the north, the Tirari-Sturt stony desert to the west, and the Nullarbor Plain to the south separates it from the Southern Ocean.
Due to the aridity and dryness of the desert, almost no farming activity is carried out there, and it is a protected area of Western Australia, .
The average annual rainfall is low, but not as low as many deserts, ranging from 200 to 250 milimetres (8 to 10 inches) per year. Thunderstorms are relatively common in the Great Victoria Desert, with an average of 15 - 20 thunderstorms per annum. Summer daytime temperatures range from 32 to 40° Celsius (90 to 140° Fahrenheit). In winter, this falls to 18 to 23° Celsius (64-75° Fahrenheit). Snow never falls in the Great Victoria Desert.
It is inhabited by many different groups of Australian Aborigines, including the Kogara and the Mirning.
The year 1875 saw British explorer Ernest Giles become the first European to cross the desert. He named the desert after the current British queen at the time, Queen Victoria.