Point Danger is a headland, located at the southern end of the Gold Coast on the east coast of Australia. Separated by Snapper Rocks and Rainbow Bay to the West, with Duranbah beach and the Tweed River mouth to the south. Present-day Point Danger has also indicated the border between New South Wales and Queensland Australia, since 1863.
The point is the location of the Captain Cook memorial and lighthouse, the Centaur Memorial and Walk of Remembrance, the Marine Rescue NSW Point Danger station, and the southern end of the Gold Coast Oceanway.
The Centaur Memorial remembers the sinking of Australian Hospital Ship Centaur by a Japanese submarine on 14 May 1943. The Walk of Remembrance commemorates other ships lost to Japanese and German action during World War II and takes the form of plaques arranged in a semicircle around the lookout fence.
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Captain James Cook while sailing North about 5 pm on 16 May 1770 (log date) encountered the reefs that run 3 nautical miles (5.6 km; 3.5 mi) east from Fingal Head and Cook Island. To avoid these reefs Cook was forced to change his course to the east. Cook's log indicates his ship was "about 5 miles from the land". However having to pull away to the east to avoid the reefs, that we now know only run 3 nautical miles (5.6 km; 3.5 mi) to sea from Cook Island, would indicate Cook was much closer to the point he named Point Danger.
The next morning, (same log date 16 May) James Cook, although much further out to sea, recorded the location of the reefs and named the point off which the island and reefs lie - Point Danger. [1] He wrote:
We now saw the breakers again they lay two Leagues from a point under which is a small Island, their situation may always be found by the peaked mountain before mentioned from them this mountain or hill, and on this account I have named Mount Warning it lies 7 or 8 Leagues inland the land is high and hilly about it, but it is conspicuous enough to be distinguished from everything else. The point off which these shoals lay I have named Point Danger.
These reefs are now named Danger Reefs and comprise Inner Reef, South Reef and Outer Reef.[2]
There has been controversy over the naming of Point Danger for many years. Evidence suggests that Fingal Head was the point James Cook named Point Danger in May 1770. As a consequence, the Geographical Names Board announced in 2008 that the official records for Point Danger and Fingal Head would be changed to reflect "both the historical versions" of the naming of Cook's Point Danger.[3] [4] [5][6]
Present-day Point Danger was misjudged for the first time to be the point named by James Cook in 1770, by Captain John Rous in August 1828.[7] John Oxley and Captain Phillip Parker King clearly identified Fingal Head to be Cook’s Point Danger.[8]
The lighthouse/Cook Memorial was finished in 1971. It is an unusual modern style lighthouse and was the first in the world to experiment with lasers to increase its beam. The experiment was unsuccessful and it returned to conventional electric lamps. It emits a double white flash every ten seconds at a focal plane height of 44.5 metres. However there are no reefs off, or running East from this point.[9] The light is operated by NSW Maritime.[10]