Tarcoola, South Australia

Tarcoola is a town in the Far North of South Australia 416 km north-northwest of Port Augusta. At the, Tarcoola had no people living within its boundaries.

Tarcoola was named after Tarcoola the winner of the 1893 Melbourne Cup horse race. The horse Tarcoola had been raised on Tarcoola Station on the Darling River in New South Wales. It means river bend in the aboriginal language of the area around that Tarcoola Station.

History
Tarcoola lies on Kokata land. The Tarcoola Goldfield was discovered and named in 1893, but it was in an isolated arid area, and there was little development until 1900. A Post Office opened on 18 August 1900 and the town was proclaimed on 21 February 1901.

The goldfield's heyday was from about 1901 to 1918. A government battery was built to process ore from small mines. Between 1901 and 1954 the field produced about 77,000oz (2.4 tonnes) of gold, most of it from the Tarcoola Blocks mine.

The Trans-Australian Railway was built through Tarcoola in 1915, and in 1980 it became a junction station when the Adelaide–Darwin railway diverged from Tarcoola to Alice Springs. The link from Alice Springs through to Darwin was eventually completed in 2004.

The town is almost completely deserted today except for transient railway maintenance staff and geological exploration teams. The original Tarcoola goldfields are long closed. However, there is now new exploration for minerals in the wider area, including the Challenger Mine.

The Tarcoola Goldfield, Battery and Township is listed on the South Australian Heritage Register as a designated place of archaeological significance.

In 2017, WPG Resources commenced mining an open pit at Tarcoola intending to mine for at least two years, and transport the ore to the Challenger mine for processing in the facilities there.

Rail
Tarcoola is now best known as the northern junction of the Sydney-Perth and Adelaide-Darwin railways, which share approximately 530 km of track between Tarcoola and Crystal Brook. There is a triangular junction at Tarcoola which joins Crystal Brook, Darwin and Perth. Another triangular junction at Crystal Brook joins Tarcoola, Adelaide and Sydney.

The Ghan and the Indian Pacific passenger services through Tarcoola both run once per week in each direction all year round, and twice per week at various times. The mail for Tarcoola arrives by train.

Governance
Tarcoola is located within the federal division of Grey, the state electoral district of Giles and the Pastoral Unincorporated Area of South Australia.

Climate
Tarcoola has a desert climate with hot, dry summers and mild winters and sparse rainfall throughout the year. A record high temperature of 49.1 °C was recorded on 24 January 2019.