Great Sandy Desert

Great Sandy Desert

Wasteland, northern Western Australia. It extends from Eighty Mile Beach on the Indian Ocean eastward into the Northern Territory and from the Kimberley Downs south to the Tropic of Capricorn and the Gibson Desert. An arid expanse of salt marshes and sand hills, it roughly coincides with the sedimentary Canning basin. Canning Stock Route (1,000 mi [1,600 km] long) spans the region from Wiluna via Lake Disappointment to Halls Creek.

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Great Sandy Desert

1. a desert in NW Australia. Area: about 415 000 sq. km (160 000 sq. miles)

2. an English name for the Rub' al Khali

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Great Sandy Desert 

a desert in northwestern Australia. Its area is 360,000 sq km, and the average elevation is 400–500 m in the south and 300 m in the north. Sand dunes averaging 10–12 m high predominate. (Their maximum height is to 30 m.) They extend latitudinally or from the east-southeast to the west-northwest in the direction of the prevailing winds and are cut by wide clay-solonchak plains (up to several hundred m). There are many saline lakes, which are sporadically filled with water: lakes Disappointment in the south, Mackay in the east, and Gregory in the north. One of the few creeks, Sturt Creek, empties into Lake Gregory. The Great Sandy Desert is one of the hottest places in Australia. In the summer (December through February) the average temperature is 35° C; in the winter, 10°–15°C. In the summer equatorial monsoons bring in occasional rains. (Precipitation is from 450 mm in the north to 200 mm in the south.) The greater part of the precipitation evaporates and soaks into the sand. The vegetation is mainly thorny xerophytic grasses (spinifex and others), acacia mulga shrubs in the south, and eucalypti in the north. The desert has no permanent population and is poorly explored.