Located off the southwestern coast of Singapore, Jurong Island is a manmade island formed through successive land reclamation works that joined up several offshore islands, namely Pulau Ayer Chawan, Pulau Ayer Merbau, Pulau Merlimau, Pulau Pesek, Pulau Pesek Kechil ...
The sovereignty of Christmas Island was transferred from Singapore (then a Crown colony of the United Kingdom) to the Commonwealth of Australia on 1 October 1958 under the Transfer to Australia Order in Council, 1958. At the close of the day on 30 September, the ...
On 23 November 1955, the administrative responsibility for the Cocos (Keeling) Islands was transferred from the Colony of Singapore to the Commonwealth of Australia. The Cocos Islands had been part of the Straits Settlements until 1946 when the latter was dissolved, ...
The influx of immigrants to Singapore in the 19th century brought various communicable diseases, such as smallpox, leprosy and cholera to the island. Health inspections and regulations became increasingly important in order to control the spread of such diseases ...
The Pan Island Expressway (PIE) is Singapore’s oldest and longest expressway. Built between 1964 and 1981, it spans the length of the island, connecting Tuas in the west and Changi Airport in the east. The PIE was initially 35 km long, but it now spans 42.8 km ...
Pulau Tekong is an island off the northeastern coast of Singapore, with Selat Johore to the north and Serangoon Harbour to the south. There were originally two islands – the larger Pulau Tekong and the smaller Pulau Tekong Kechil – but land reclamation joined them ...
Sisters’ Islands is located south of Singapore and is made up of two islands that are separated by narrow but deep channels. The islands are individually known as Pulau Subar Darat (Little Sister’s Island) and Pulau Subar Laut (Big Sister’s Island) and each covers ...
Coney Island, also known as Pulau Serangoon, is located off the coast of Punggol in northeastern Singapore. Originally just 13 ha, the island now spans 100 ha after a series of reclamation projects. A 50-hectare park managed by the National Parks Board was opened ...
Kusu Island is located 5.6 km south-west of Singapore. A Chinese temple and three Malay keramat (shrine) on the island attract thousands of pilgrims annually, especially in the 9th lunar month that falls between September and October. Kusu means “tortoise” or “turtle” ...
The robber crab (Birgus latro) is the largest of the various crab species found on Christmas Island. Able to climb trees, the crabs only return to water during breeding season to lay eggs. However, the most notorious crab species is the red crab (Gecarcoidea natalis), ...
St John's Island is a southern island famous for its history as a penal settlement but is now a holiday resort.
Pulau Senang is one of Singapore’s southern islands. Its land area is about 81.7 ha, and it is located 24 km from the mainland. Now a military live-firing zone, Pulau Senang is famous for being a penal settlement from 1960 to 1963. The prison-without-bars experiment ...
Pulau Satumu, or “one tree island”, was formerly known as Coney Island. The origin of its name could have been derived from the Malay language with “sa” referring to satu (meaning one) and “tumu” referring to the large mangrove tree, Bruguiera confugata. It is ...
Located 5.5 km southwest of mainland Singapore, the offshore island of Pulau Bukom (also spelt “Bukum”) houses an integrated oil and petrochemicals site with manufacturing facilities for fuels, lubricant base oils and specialty chemicals. It was known as Pulau ...
Pulau Brani, which means “isle of the brave” in Malay, is an island situated at the south of Singapore’s Central Region. It was once home to the Orang Laut. For a while, the island had a brick kiln, a coal depot, a tin smelting plant and a ship-repairing dock. ...
Located off Singapore’s south coast, Pulau Sudong was classified as one of the Western Islands in the Urban Redevelopment Authority’s 1997 Concept Plan. A 1946 survey of the Singapore Strait described the island as measuring about 55 ft high to the top of the trees, ...
Pulau Meskol was a small island of 6.1 ha in a cluster of islands lying south of Jurong on the Singapore mainland. It was merged with neighbouring islands to form Jurong Island, where the petrochemical and petroleum industry is located.
Pulau Seking (also known as Pulau Sakeng or Siking) is one of the islands off Singapore’s south coast. It was home to the last Southern island kampong (village) community, before the islanders were resettled to make way for the development of a landfill.
Singapore’s first industrial estate is located in Jurong. Before its transformation into an industrial estate, Jurong was a landscape covered in forest and swamp, with crocodile-infested rivers. There were also fish and prawn ponds. Reclamation work began in the ...
The Straits Settlements, comprising Penang, Malacca and Singapore, was an administrative unit of the East India Company (1826–1867) and later the British Colonial Office (1867–1946). It was formed in 1826 as a presidency under the administration of the East India ...