Buried

A Tin City shack sits half-buried in the Stockton Bight dunes, its lower walls already taken by the sand. The roof is corrugated iron, intact. The visible portion of the wall is timber framing with corrugated cladding nailed across it. Where the sand meets the wall, the metal is gone, eaten through by salt and wind. The dune comes up to the underside of one of the windows. There is no clear edge between sand and structure; the wind has carried the dune in from the windward side, packed against the wall, and over time covered first the foundations, then the lower courses, then the door.

The Stockton Bight dunes are the largest moving coastal sand mass in the southern hemisphere. The dunes shift several metres per year on the prevailing winds. Tin City shacks have been buried, dug out, rebuilt, and buried again throughout the settlement's history. Some buildings have been lost entirely under the sand and replaced with new structures further up the slope. Others have been kept clear by the daily work of their owners, shovelled out after every storm. The shack in this photograph is at the point of being given up to the dunes. Whether it is dug out again, abandoned, or replaced is the kind of decision the settlement makes year by year.