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Christmas Island

image by Željko Heimer
Flag adopted 1986-APR

History of the flag
Symbolism of the flag

See also

Australia

History of the Flag

Status: Unofficial

The flag of Christmas Island was chosen from a flag competition held in 1986 and announced on April 14, 1986. There were 69 entries in the competition which had a prize of $100 (Australian). The winning design was created by Tony Couch of Sydney, who had worked on the island for 4 years as a phosphate mining rigging supervisor. Although the flag was selected, its status has not been officially approved by the Christmas Island Assembly.

Symbolism of the flag

The blue and green triangles represent the sea surrounding the island and the vegetation of the island. The Southern cross in the blue triangle is the representation appearing in the Australian flag.

The image in the green triangle is the Golden Bosun Burd, which is unique to the island.

The gold disk in the center of the flag represents the island's phosphate mining history and originally included to provide a background for the green map of Christmas Island.

The flag was certainly influenced by that of Papua New Guinea
Željko Heimer, 7 February 2001

Carlos Esperza suggests that the southern cross may have stars with different numbers of points, as on the Victorian and Northern Territory flags:

image by Carlos Esperza