A private funeral service was held for Australian TV naturalist Steve Irwin on Saturday and he will be buried at his family's zoo in the northern state of Queensland, local media reported.
Irwin's father, Bob Irwin, had declined a government offer for a state funeral for his son.
Irwin, known as the "Crocodile Hunter" after his popular TV documentaries which aired around the world, was killed six days ago by a stingray barb to the chest while diving on Australia's Great Barrier Reef.
PHOTO: AP
After the funeral service his body was taken to his family's Australia Zoo wildlife park, where he is expected to be buried, local media reported yesterday.
Irwin, 44, had flirted with death many times in his Crocodile Hunter documentaries, seen by 200 million people, wrestling with some of the world's most dangerous creatures.
News of Irwin's death clogged Internet news sites and drew tributes from around the world. Prime Minister John Howard interrupted parliament to pay tribute to him, saying he was distressed by the loss of a remarkable Australian.
A public memorial service that is likely to draw thousands of mourners was expected to take place later this month.
Hundreds more fans continued their procession to the 25-hectare Australia Zoo that was opened in 1970 by Bob Irwin.
Each day since Irwin's fatal accident, mourners have come to the zoo to leave flowers, candles, cards and stuffed animals behind and to sign one of Irwin's trademark khaki shirts in lieu of a commemoration book.
The shirts, now numbering near 100, are tacked on a brick building at the front of the zoo that has become the focal point of the outpouring of grief for Irwin.
Meanwhile, nearly 300 surfers gathered off Australia's eastern coast yesterday to cast flowers into the Pacific Ocean in Irwin's honor.
Lifeguard Nigel Morton said the surfers assembled in the water at Alexandra Headland in Queensland state in honor of the wildlife fanatic who was also an accomplished surfer.
"They paddled out probably about 300m offshore and made a very large circle," Morton said. "There were several surfers in the center of the circle that conducted the service."
SPEAKING OUT: After Siranudh Scott’s allegations surfaced, celebrities and public figures took to social media to share their own experiences of sexual misconduct and abuse A high-profile alleged sexual abuse case within a wealthy Thai beer brewing family has prompted a wave of painful accounts from survivors of unconnected abuse in the conservative nation. Siranudh Scott, a member of the billionaire Thai family that founded the ubiquitous Singha beer brand, posted an emotional video this month accusing his elder brother Sunit of repeatedly abusing him when he was a teenager. Sunit, who is in his 30s, later denied the allegations in a video posted online, but Singha parent Boonrawd dismissed him from his executive role with the company on Tuesday last week. “I felt I needed to speak
A Hong Kong astronaut is to join a Chinese space mission for the first time as part of a three-person crew launching today, as Beijing edges closer to its goal of landing people on the moon. The Tiangong space station — crewed by teams of three astronauts that are typically rotated every six months — is the crown jewel of China’s space program, boosted by billions in state investment in a bid to catch up with the US and Russia. The Shenzhou-23 mission is to blast off at 11:08pm from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwestern China, carrying three astronauts to
UPGRADED ALERT: The risk inside DR Congo is now considered ‘very high,’ while neighboring countries face a ‘high’ threat as the outbreak continues, the WHO said Ebola is spreading faster than responders can track it in eastern Congo, where health workers managed to follow up with barely one in five identified contacts in a single day. Authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) reported 83 confirmed infections, 746 suspected cases and 1,603 identified contacts as of Thursday, but health workers were able to follow up on only 342 contacts that day — about 21 percent of the total under monitoring — data released by the DR Congo Ministry of Public Health on Friday showed. The figures suggest the response is falling behind the outbreak itself,
SEEKING ORDER: Rodrigo Paz said that ‘anyone who wants to destroy the nation will have to deal with this president and the full force of the constitution’ Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz on Wednesday said that the nation was at a “breaking point” after nearly a month of protests that have caused shortages of food, fuel and medicine. Paz, who took office six months ago amid the worst economic crisis there in four decades, is battling a groundswell of fury over his policies. The political capital, La Paz, has been besieged by low-income workers and members of the indigenous majority calling for his resignation. “The country needs order and is reaching breaking point,” the 58-year-old said at a public event in La Paz, renewing his appeal for dialogue. On Tuesday, the Bolivian
RSS