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Balladonia is the most westerly of the roadhouse/settlements along the Nullarbor Plain and was one of the sites of the overland telegraph stations.
Around the middle of the nineteenth century, pastoralists took up land and arrived with sheep and cattle. Supplies came in by ship and camels were used for much of the overland transport. The Cameleers were known as Afghans. Later, camel trains provided vital haulage to the Goldfields and for the Trans-Australian railway construction in 1917.
Just before WW2, outback tracks were rapidly converted to a road. Travellers described it as: “corrugations, potholes and dust”. Today Eyre Highway carries an enormous tonnage of commercial freight.
In July 1979, wreckage of America’s NASA Skylab showered back to earth, making its fiery re-entry across southern WA. The space laboratory had been as high as a 9 story building and had been orbiting the earth for six years before becoming unstable. A replica and impressive interpretive displays can be seen at Balladonia Musem and debris of Skylab at Esperance Museum.
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