George Nares
Encyclopedia
Vice-Admiral Sir George Strong Nares KCB
FRS (24 April 1831–15 January 1915) was a British
naval officer and Arctic
explorer. He commanded both the Challenger Expedition
and the British Arctic Expedition
, and was highly thought of a leader and a scientific explorer. In later life he worked for the Board of Trade and as Acting Conservator of the River Mersey
, and died in 1915 aged 83.
in Monmouthshire
. He was baptised at the church of St Bridget, Llansanffraid on 22 May. He married Mary Grant, the eldest daughter of a Portsmouth banker, on 22 June 1858. They had four sons and six daughters. His two youngest sons, George Edward Nares (lieutenant, d. 1905) and John Dodd Nares (vice-admiral, d. 1957) entered the Royal Navy.
in New Cross, and in 1845 joined the Royal Navy aboard , an old battleship captured from the French. Following a posting to on the Australian station in 1848 during which he served as both midshipman and mate, he returned in 1851 and passed his lieutenant's exam in 1852.
, a future Hydrographer of the Navy, who had suggested he apply to Sir Edward Belcher
for a place on his search for Sir John Franklin
. Nares was accepted as the second mate of , and thus gained valuable early experience of the Arctic during the 1852-1854 expedition.
. Glatton arrived in the Black Sea too late to see action.
, which he commanded from 1865. Although he had served in the steam-assisted Conqueror over ten years previously, this was his first paddle steamer, and in a further departure, she was employed in surveying duties on the east coast of Australia. His duties involved keeping the communications between Sydney and Cape York
in the furthest north point of Queensland open. On the long journeys between he conducted surveys of the Great Barrier Reef
. The county of Nares in Queensland
was named after him. His next appointment was to the brand new ,The journal Nature
(21 January 1915) tells that when Newport was at Malta in 1869 the chief engineer, who was anxious not to go to sea because he wanted to attend some function on shore with his wife, asked to be given forty-eight hours to take off the cylinder covers. Captain Nares replied "By all means." The chief engineer was jubilant, but on the planned day of sailing, after the usual morning muster by division, the order was given "Hands make sail", and the ship sailed out of the harbour without the aid of the engines, much to the chagrin of the engineer staff. Nature reports this as an example of his competence under sail and that it "was a good lesson given with tact and judgement".(Nature, 94, 565-567 (21 January 1915) ) which he commissioned and took to the Mediterranean for survey work, including a survey of the Gulf of Suez
, accessed by the newly-opened Suez Canal
.The Suez Canal opened in November 1869. His obituary records that he managed an impressive feat of seamanship by placing himself ahead of the French Imperial yacht L'Aigle in the night and thus being the first ship to pass through the canal.
In recognition of his work in the Gulf of Suez, Nares was promoted to the rank of captain in 1869. He commissioned in 1871 for the Red Sea, and on the outward voyage the ship conducted studies of the water currents in the Straits of Gibraltar for William Benjamin Carpenter
, a biologist who believed that density differences between water masses generated ocean currents.
Charles Wyville Thomson
and the Royal Society of London obtained the corvette from the Royal Navy for a 3-year expedition of scientific discovery. Although much of the world was well charted, this extended only to the coastlines and to very shallow depths - largely depths significant to the safe navigation of ships. There was a widely-held consensus that the oceans were in parts very deep, but almost nothing was known of the make up of the deep oceans, the submarine landscape, nor the life contained within the deep ocean. Challenger was equipped to measure much of this, being loaded with specimen jars, chemical apparatus, trawls and dredges, thermometers and water sampling bottles, sounding leads and devices to collect sediment from the sea bed. Great lengths of rope were provided to allow the sounding of deep oceans, and of Italian hemp alone she carried a total length of 181 miles (291 km).
Nares was given command of the Challenger Expedition
, a recognition of his experience in this field, but also of his scientific approach to surveying and exploration. His work with William Carpenter in Shearwater had been a key factor in the choice of commanding officer. His officers were all naval surveyors, and the team of civilian scientists, led by Charles Wyville Thomson.
Challenger spent a year in the Atlantic and after turning east in early 1874 she turned south in the Indian Ocean, visiting the Prince Edward
, Kerguelen
, and Heard islands. She reached as far south as 66°40' S 78°22' E before reaching the ice pack. In the process she became the first steam vessel to cross the Antarctic Circle.
Not all similar expeditions had been so successful, and in particular the easy relations between the scientific gentlemen and the naval officers was a testament to the sure leadership of George Nares. It was therefore a measure of his success as the commander of a scientific expedition that he was recalled in November 1874 to lead a similar but more arduous expedition at the opposite end of the earth.
in Discovery
and Alert
in 1875, the British Arctic Expedition
. On this expedition, Nares became the first explorer to take his ships all the way north through the channel between Greenland
and Ellesmere Island
—now named Nares Strait
in his honor—to the Lincoln Sea
. Up to this time, it had been a popular theory that this route would lead to the supposed Open Polar Sea
, an ice-free region surrounding the pole, but Nares found only a wasteland of ice. A sledging party under Albert Hastings Markham
set a new record farthest north of 83° 20' 26"N, but overall the expedition was a near-disaster. The men suffered badly from scurvy
and were hampered by inappropriate clothing and equipment. Realizing that his men could not survive another winter in the ice, Nares hastily retreated southward with both his ships in the summer of 1876. Nares wrote an account of the expedition, Narrative of a Voyage to the Polar Sea during 1875-6 H.M. Ships "Alert" and "Discovery" and published by Sampson, Low, Searle & Rivington of London.
Nares was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1876, received the founder's medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1877 and was awarded the Gold medal from Société de Géographie
in 1879. These scientific awards were matched by an appointment as a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath
in 1876.
. He left the ship on 11 March 1879, and from 1879 to 1896 was employed in the harbour department of the Board of Trade. During this period he retired from the Royal Navy, on 24 April 1886. He was promoted on the retired list twice, firstly in 1887 to rear-admiral, and secondly in 1892 to vice-admiral.
Antarctic expedition. His wife Mary died in 1905.
, Surrey, on 15 January 1915 and was buried in Long Ditton churchyard on 19 January.
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
FRS (24 April 1831–15 January 1915) was a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
naval officer and Arctic
Arctic
The Arctic is a region located at the northern-most part of the Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Russia, Greenland, the United States, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland. The Arctic region consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost...
explorer. He commanded both the Challenger Expedition
Challenger expedition
The Challenger expedition of 1872–76 was a scientific exercise that made many discoveries to lay the foundation of oceanography. The expedition was named after the mother vessel, HMS Challenger....
and the British Arctic Expedition
British Arctic Expedition
The British Arctic Expedition of 1875-1876, led by Sir George Strong Nares, was sent by the British Admiralty to attempt to reach the North Pole via Smith Sound. Two ships, HMS Alert and HMS Discovery , sailed from Portsmouth on 29 May 1875...
, and was highly thought of a leader and a scientific explorer. In later life he worked for the Board of Trade and as Acting Conservator of the River Mersey
Acting Conservator of the River Mersey
The Acting Conservator of the River Mersey is a unique position. The holder is responsible for ensuring navigation on, and protecting the environment of, the River Mersey in the North West of England...
, and died in 1915 aged 83.
Family
He was born on 24 April 1831, the third son and sixth child of Commander William Henry Nares, a British naval officer, and Elizabeth Rebecca Gould, at Llansenseld, near AbergavennyAbergavenny
Abergavenny , meaning Mouth of the River Gavenny, is a market town in Monmouthshire, Wales. It is located 15 miles west of Monmouth on the A40 and A465 roads, 6 miles from the English border. Originally the site of a Roman fort, Gobannium, it became a medieval walled town within the Welsh Marches...
in Monmouthshire
Monmouthshire (historic)
Monmouthshire , also known as the County of Monmouth , is one of thirteen ancient counties of Wales and a former administrative county....
. He was baptised at the church of St Bridget, Llansanffraid on 22 May. He married Mary Grant, the eldest daughter of a Portsmouth banker, on 22 June 1858. They had four sons and six daughters. His two youngest sons, George Edward Nares (lieutenant, d. 1905) and John Dodd Nares (vice-admiral, d. 1957) entered the Royal Navy.
Education and early service in the Royal Navy
He was educated at the Royal Naval SchoolRoyal Naval School
The Royal Naval School was an English school that was established in Camberwell, London, in 1833 and then formally constituted by the Royal Naval College Act 1840. It was a charitable institution, established as a boarding school for the sons of officers in the Royal Navy and Royal Marines. Many of...
in New Cross, and in 1845 joined the Royal Navy aboard , an old battleship captured from the French. Following a posting to on the Australian station in 1848 during which he served as both midshipman and mate, he returned in 1851 and passed his lieutenant's exam in 1852.
First Arctic experience
While returning to England in Havannah in 1851, Nares had met Commander George Henry RichardsGeorge Henry Richards
Admiral Sir George Henry Richards was Hydrographer to the British Admiralty from 1864 to 1874.-Early life:Richards was born in Anthony, Cornwall, the son of Captain G S Richards, and joined the navy in 1832....
, a future Hydrographer of the Navy, who had suggested he apply to Sir Edward Belcher
Edward Belcher
Admiral Sir Edward Belcher, KCB , was a British naval officer and explorer. He was the great-grandson of Governor Jonathan Belcher. His wife, Diana Jolliffe, was the stepdaughter of Captain Peter Heywood.-Early life:...
for a place on his search for Sir John Franklin
John Franklin
Rear-Admiral Sir John Franklin KCH FRGS RN was a British Royal Navy officer and Arctic explorer. Franklin also served as governor of Tasmania for several years. In his last expedition, he disappeared while attempting to chart and navigate a section of the Northwest Passage in the Canadian Arctic...
. Nares was accepted as the second mate of , and thus gained valuable early experience of the Arctic during the 1852-1854 expedition.
Gunnery specialist
In 1854 Nares received his promotion to lieutenant and specialised as a gunnery officer. He joined the new battleship in 1854, including service in the Mediterranean during the Crimean War. During this time he was loaned to the under the command of Captain Arthur CummingArthur Cumming (Royal Navy officer)
Admiral Sir Arthur Cumming KCB was an officer of the Royal Navy. He was born in Nancy, France to Sir Henry Cumming, a general in the British Army and received naval education at the Royal Naval College in Portsmouth...
. Glatton arrived in the Black Sea too late to see action.
Cadet instructor and author
He served as a lieutenant in charge of training cadets in , and from 1859, in her successor, . During this time he wrote the best-selling book The Naval Cadet's Guide, which was also republished under the title Seamanship, and was regarded as the best manual of its day. He was promoted to commander in 1862 and took command of the training ship in September 1863.Surveyor
His next ship was the ageing 4-gun wooden paddle sloopSloop-of-war
In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...
, which he commanded from 1865. Although he had served in the steam-assisted Conqueror over ten years previously, this was his first paddle steamer, and in a further departure, she was employed in surveying duties on the east coast of Australia. His duties involved keeping the communications between Sydney and Cape York
Cape York Peninsula
Cape York Peninsula is a large remote peninsula located in Far North Queensland at the tip of the state of Queensland, Australia, the largest unspoilt wilderness in northern Australia and one of the last remaining wilderness areas on Earth...
in the furthest north point of Queensland open. On the long journeys between he conducted surveys of the Great Barrier Reef
Great Barrier Reef
The Great Barrier Reef is the world'slargest reef system composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over 2,600 kilometres over an area of approximately...
. The county of Nares in Queensland
Queensland
Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
was named after him. His next appointment was to the brand new ,The journal Nature
Nature (journal)
Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
(21 January 1915) tells that when Newport was at Malta in 1869 the chief engineer, who was anxious not to go to sea because he wanted to attend some function on shore with his wife, asked to be given forty-eight hours to take off the cylinder covers. Captain Nares replied "By all means." The chief engineer was jubilant, but on the planned day of sailing, after the usual morning muster by division, the order was given "Hands make sail", and the ship sailed out of the harbour without the aid of the engines, much to the chagrin of the engineer staff. Nature reports this as an example of his competence under sail and that it "was a good lesson given with tact and judgement".(Nature, 94, 565-567 (21 January 1915) ) which he commissioned and took to the Mediterranean for survey work, including a survey of the Gulf of Suez
Gulf of Suez
The northern end of the Red Sea is bifurcated by the Sinai Peninsula, creating the Gulf of Suez in the west and the Gulf of Aqaba to the east. The Gulf of Suez is formed within a relatively young, but now inactive rift basin, the Gulf of Suez Rift, dating back about 28 million years...
, accessed by the newly-opened Suez Canal
Suez Canal
The Suez Canal , also known by the nickname "The Highway to India", is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. Opened in November 1869 after 10 years of construction work, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without navigation...
.The Suez Canal opened in November 1869. His obituary records that he managed an impressive feat of seamanship by placing himself ahead of the French Imperial yacht L'Aigle in the night and thus being the first ship to pass through the canal.
In recognition of his work in the Gulf of Suez, Nares was promoted to the rank of captain in 1869. He commissioned in 1871 for the Red Sea, and on the outward voyage the ship conducted studies of the water currents in the Straits of Gibraltar for William Benjamin Carpenter
William Benjamin Carpenter
William Benjamin Carpenter MD CB FRS was an English physician, invertebrate zoologist and physiologist. He was instrumental in the early stages of the unified University of London.-Life:...
, a biologist who believed that density differences between water masses generated ocean currents.
Challenger expedition
Charles Wyville Thomson
Sir Charles Wyville Thomson was a Scottish zoologist and chief scientist on the Challenger expedition.-Career:...
and the Royal Society of London obtained the corvette from the Royal Navy for a 3-year expedition of scientific discovery. Although much of the world was well charted, this extended only to the coastlines and to very shallow depths - largely depths significant to the safe navigation of ships. There was a widely-held consensus that the oceans were in parts very deep, but almost nothing was known of the make up of the deep oceans, the submarine landscape, nor the life contained within the deep ocean. Challenger was equipped to measure much of this, being loaded with specimen jars, chemical apparatus, trawls and dredges, thermometers and water sampling bottles, sounding leads and devices to collect sediment from the sea bed. Great lengths of rope were provided to allow the sounding of deep oceans, and of Italian hemp alone she carried a total length of 181 miles (291 km).
Nares was given command of the Challenger Expedition
Challenger expedition
The Challenger expedition of 1872–76 was a scientific exercise that made many discoveries to lay the foundation of oceanography. The expedition was named after the mother vessel, HMS Challenger....
, a recognition of his experience in this field, but also of his scientific approach to surveying and exploration. His work with William Carpenter in Shearwater had been a key factor in the choice of commanding officer. His officers were all naval surveyors, and the team of civilian scientists, led by Charles Wyville Thomson.
Challenger spent a year in the Atlantic and after turning east in early 1874 she turned south in the Indian Ocean, visiting the Prince Edward
Prince Edward Islands
The Prince Edward Islands are two small islands in the sub-antarctic Indian Ocean that are part of South Africa. The islands, named Marion Island and Prince Edward Island, are located at ....
, Kerguelen
Kerguelen Islands
The Kerguelen Islands , also known as the Desolation Islands, are a group of islands in the southern Indian Ocean constituting the emerged part of the otherwise submerged Kerguelen Plateau. The islands, along with Adélie Land, the Crozet Islands and the Amsterdam and Saint Paul Islands are part of...
, and Heard islands. She reached as far south as 66°40' S 78°22' E before reaching the ice pack. In the process she became the first steam vessel to cross the Antarctic Circle.
Not all similar expeditions had been so successful, and in particular the easy relations between the scientific gentlemen and the naval officers was a testament to the sure leadership of George Nares. It was therefore a measure of his success as the commander of a scientific expedition that he was recalled in November 1874 to lead a similar but more arduous expedition at the opposite end of the earth.
British Arctic Expedition
Because of his previous experience in the Arctic, he was summoned from this assignment to take charge of another Arctic voyage in search of the North PoleNorth Pole
The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is, subject to the caveats explained below, defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface...
in Discovery
HMS Discovery (1874)
HMS Discovery was a wooden screw storeship, formerly the whaling ship Bloodhound. She was purchased in 1874 for the British Arctic Expedition of 1875–1876 and was sold in 1902.-Design and Construction:...
and Alert
HMS Alert (1856)
HMS Alert was a 17-gun wooden screw sloop of the Cruizer class of the Royal Navy, launched in 1856 and broken up in 1894. She was the eleventh ship of the Royal Navy to bear the name , and was noted for her Arctic exploration work; in 1876 she reached a record latitude of 82°N.-Construction:The...
in 1875, the British Arctic Expedition
British Arctic Expedition
The British Arctic Expedition of 1875-1876, led by Sir George Strong Nares, was sent by the British Admiralty to attempt to reach the North Pole via Smith Sound. Two ships, HMS Alert and HMS Discovery , sailed from Portsmouth on 29 May 1875...
. On this expedition, Nares became the first explorer to take his ships all the way north through the channel between Greenland
Greenland
Greenland is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe for...
and Ellesmere Island
Ellesmere Island
Ellesmere Island is part of the Qikiqtaaluk Region of the Canadian territory of Nunavut. Lying within the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, it is considered part of the Queen Elizabeth Islands, with Cape Columbia being the most northerly point of land in Canada...
—now named Nares Strait
Nares Strait
Nares Strait is a waterway between Ellesmere Island and Greenland that is the northern part of Baffin Bay where it meets the Lincoln Sea. From south to north, the strait includes Smith Sound, Kane Basin, Kennedy Channel, Hall Basin and Robeson Channel...
in his honor—to the Lincoln Sea
Lincoln Sea
Lincoln Sea is a body of water in the Arctic Ocean, stretching from Cape Columbia, Canada, in the west to Cape Morris Jesup, Greenland, in the east. The northern limit is defined as the great circle line between those two headlands. It is covered with sea ice throughout the year, the thickest sea...
. Up to this time, it had been a popular theory that this route would lead to the supposed Open Polar Sea
Open Polar Sea
The Open Polar Sea was a hypothesized ice-free ocean surrounding the North Pole. This unproven theory was once so widely believed that many exploring expeditions used it as justification for attempts to reach the North Pole by sea, or to find a navigable sea route between Europe and the Pacific...
, an ice-free region surrounding the pole, but Nares found only a wasteland of ice. A sledging party under Albert Hastings Markham
Albert Hastings Markham
Admiral Sir Albert Hastings Markham, KCB was a British explorer, author, and officer in the Royal Navy. In 1903 he was made Knight Commander in the Order of the Bath...
set a new record farthest north of 83° 20' 26"N, but overall the expedition was a near-disaster. The men suffered badly from scurvy
Scurvy
Scurvy is a disease resulting from a deficiency of vitamin C, which is required for the synthesis of collagen in humans. The chemical name for vitamin C, ascorbic acid, is derived from the Latin name of scurvy, scorbutus, which also provides the adjective scorbutic...
and were hampered by inappropriate clothing and equipment. Realizing that his men could not survive another winter in the ice, Nares hastily retreated southward with both his ships in the summer of 1876. Nares wrote an account of the expedition, Narrative of a Voyage to the Polar Sea during 1875-6 H.M. Ships "Alert" and "Discovery" and published by Sampson, Low, Searle & Rivington of London.
Nares was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1876, received the founder's medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1877 and was awarded the Gold medal from Société de Géographie
Société de Géographie
The Société de Géographie , is the world's oldest geographical society. It was founded in 1821 . Since 1878, its headquarters has been at 184 Boulevard Saint-Germain, Paris. The entrance is marked by two gigantic caryatids representing Land and Sea...
in 1879. These scientific awards were matched by an appointment as a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
in 1876.
Later Royal Naval career
In 1878 he was appointed in command of Alert, his ship from the Arctic expedition, in which he surveyed the Strait of MagellanStrait of Magellan
The Strait of Magellan comprises a navigable sea route immediately south of mainland South America and north of Tierra del Fuego...
. He left the ship on 11 March 1879, and from 1879 to 1896 was employed in the harbour department of the Board of Trade. During this period he retired from the Royal Navy, on 24 April 1886. He was promoted on the retired list twice, firstly in 1887 to rear-admiral, and secondly in 1892 to vice-admiral.
Later work
After leaving the Board of Trade in 1896 he became a conservator of the River Mersey, a post which he held until 1910. He was a member of the ship committee for Scott'sRobert Falcon Scott
Captain Robert Falcon Scott, CVO was a Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery Expedition, 1901–04, and the ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13...
Antarctic expedition. His wife Mary died in 1905.
Death
Nares died at home aged 83 at Kingston upon ThamesKingston upon Thames
Kingston upon Thames is the principal settlement of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames in southwest London. It was the ancient market town where Saxon kings were crowned and is now a suburb situated south west of Charing Cross. It is one of the major metropolitan centres identified in the...
, Surrey, on 15 January 1915 and was buried in Long Ditton churchyard on 19 January.
Legacy
Among others, the following features are named after him:- Nares LandNares LandNares Land is an island in northern Greenland. Its area is 1466 km²....
in Greenland. - Nares StraitNares StraitNares Strait is a waterway between Ellesmere Island and Greenland that is the northern part of Baffin Bay where it meets the Lincoln Sea. From south to north, the strait includes Smith Sound, Kane Basin, Kennedy Channel, Hall Basin and Robeson Channel...
between Ellesmere Island and Greenland. - Mount Nares, part of the Churchill Mountains in Antarctica.
- Nares LakeNares LakeNares Lake is a lake in the southern Yukon between Bennett Lake and Tagish Lake. This lake lies below Nares Mountain. Nares Lake is actually an arm of Tagish Lake. The community of Carcross, Yukon is on the Nares Narrows between Bennett and Tagish Lake, along the Klondike Highway.Named after...
in southern YukonYukonYukon is the westernmost and smallest of Canada's three federal territories. It was named after the Yukon River. The word Yukon means "Great River" in Gwich’in....
between Bennett Lake and Tagish LakeTagish LakeTagish Lake is a lake in the Yukon Territory and northern British Columbia, Canada. The lake is more than long and about 2 km wide.It has two arms, the Taku Arm in the east which is very long and mostly in British Columbia and Windy Arm in the west, mostly in the Yukon. The Klondike Highway runs...
. - Nares Deep, the deepest part of the North Atlantic.
- Nares Cape, on Ellesmere Island.
- Nares River, from Nares Lake past Carcross to Bennett Lake.
- Nares Mountain, in Yukon, named in 1883 by Lt Schwatka of the US Army.
- Nares Inlet, Ontario
- County of Nares in QueenslandQueenslandQueensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...
, Australia.