Christmas Island facing economic collapse as mine expansion rejected to save red crabs

The community of Christmas Island could face an economic collapse after a proposal to expand the island's phosphate mine was knocked back over fears of the impact to the island's wildlife, including its world-famous red crabs.

Red crabs make their way along a Christmas Island Road
 during their annual migration from the rainforest to the ocean to mate.

Phosphate Resources Limited has been mining on the Indian Ocean Territory for more than 100 years, but claims it needs to clear more crown land to access new deposits in order for the operations to remain viable.

Under the expansion, the company wanted to clear an additional 6.83 hectares of land to undertake exploration drilling to determine the extent of more phosphate resources, in what has been described as a pristine area of the island.

Read the story by Kathryn Diss from ABC News - “Christmas Island facing economic collapse as mine expansion rejected to save red crabs.”

How heat affects roads, trains and planes

Roads can soften, train tracks do expand and, when temperatures are high enough, the book on how to fly some planes literally hasn't been written.

Cars backed up on the Hume Freeway near Seymour.

This is how heat can affect the three modes of transport we depend on most.

They could "melt" or soften and become sticky.

Roads are made up of a gravel base, bitumen and then aggregate (crushed rock).

Professor Frank Bullen specialises in road pavement engineering and says: "The role of the bitumen is to hold the aggregate in place for the traffic to go over."

Read the ABC News story - “How heat affects roads, trains and planes.”