Southern Aurora Memorial

This artwork is a very moving memorial.

A memorial garden that incorporates unique street art and honours those affected by one of Australia’s worst train crashes has been named as the best monument to see in Australia.

Southern Aurora railway tragedy.

The terrible sound of a head-on train crash just after 7:00am on Feb 7 1969 shook the town awake. Without delay volunteers went to work: to enter the wreckage, locate and rescue survivors and control the fires in the tangled mess. Others did much behind the scenes like: first aid, transport, communications, catering, security, nursing, accomodation and spiritual and human support. 

The commemoration gardens has an overall theme of Helping Hands. It is a way of signifying how people stepped forward to help each other, whether women or men, staff or passengers, whether voluntary or paid, or whether local or from far away. Everyone did what they could.