While today Bogantungan is just a few houses on the highway, it has its place in history.
On 26 February 1960, Bogantungan became the site of one of Queensland’s worst train disasters. The Midlander passenger train, heading east to Rockhampton, passed over the flooded Medway Creek, just west of the town. The bridge collapsed when the train was partly over, and a number of carriages dropped into the water. Sadly, four passengers and three crew were killed, and 43 people were injured.
The Bogantungan Historical Railway Station has numerous interpretive panels and memorabilia about the crash.
Bogantungan was once a thriving railway town. In the early 1880s, it had 28 hotels, several churches, numerous businesses and sporting clubs, and a racecourse. The railway building dates from around this time and includes the original Refreshment Room, built between 1916 and 1924, and the water tank, believed to have been built in 1916.
You can find Bogantungan just off the Capricorn Highway, about an hour’s drive west of Emerald.
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