Flag of Heard Island and McDonald Islands

What the flag of Heard Island and McDonald Islands looks like

The territory has no flag of its own and uses the national flag of Australia. It is a blue field with the Union Jack in the upper hoist corner. Below the Union Jack is the Commonwealth Star, a large white star with seven points. On the fly side is the Southern Cross, a constellation of five white stars: four with seven points and one smaller star with five. The proportions are 1:2.

The Heard Island and McDonald Islands flag emoji shows this same design. The original is on the page for Australia.

Meaning of the Australian flag on the islands

The Union Jack stands for Australia's origins as a group of British colonies. The Commonwealth Star has one point for each of the six original states and one for the territories. The Southern Cross is visible in the sky from the southern hemisphere, and it is suited to remote southern territories like these. The colors are blue, red and white, shared with the British flag.

People sometimes ask why Australia has three flags. The Australian National Flag is the one flown here. The Australian Aboriginal Flag and the Torres Strait Islander Flag were also given official status as flags of Australia in 1995, but they represent people rather than territory and are not used for Heard Island.

History of the territory and the flag

American captain John Heard sighted Heard Island in 1853, and William McDonald sighted the nearby McDonald Islands the next year. Sealers worked the area for some decades. The United Kingdom claimed the islands, and in 1947 it transferred them to Australia, which set up a research station at Atlas Cove that operated until 1955. Since then the islands have been left to scientists and occasional expeditions.

The Australian flag was chosen in a public competition in 1901 and approved by the British government in 1903. The seventh point on the Commonwealth Star was added in 1908, and the flag was confirmed as the national flag by the Flags Act of 1953. The islands were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1997 for their unspoiled nature.

Who lives on the islands

Nobody. The group lies about 4,000 kilometers southwest of Perth. Heard Island is mostly covered by glaciers and contains Big Ben, a volcano whose peak, Mawson Peak, is the highest mountain in Australian territory. The McDonald Islands are smaller and have also erupted in recent decades. Access is by a voyage of about two weeks, and entry needs permission from the Australian Antarctic Division.