Vandals destroy 30,000-year-old finger paintings in Australian cave. ‘Irreparable’

Ancient cave paintings from up to 30,000 years ago were damaged beyond repair by vandals in Australia, experts and officials say.

Officials believe vandals removed a barbed wire section of fencing to access Koonalda Cave, according to Kyam Maher, the South Australian Attorney General and Minister for Aboriginal Affairs. Maher said in a Dec. 20 interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that once inside the cave, the vandals put graffiti over the ancient finger-paintings.

“The vandalism of Koonalda Cave is shocking and heartbreaking,” Maher said in a statement to McClatchy News. “Koonalda Cave is of significant importance to the Mirning People, and its tens of thousands of years of history shows some of the earliest evidence of Aboriginal occupation in that part of the country.”

Koonalda Cave is a national heritage site that is credited with “transforming our contemporary understanding of the extraordinary age of Aboriginal art, archaeology and occupation in Australia,” the Australian Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water’s website says. The site is particularly special for the country’s Mirning population.

Now, the site has been all but destroyed by the graffiti, experts say.

“The vandals caused a huge amount of damage. The art is not recoverable,” Keryn Walshe, an archaeologist who specializes in ancient Aboriginal sites, told The Guardian. “The surface of the cave is very soft. It is not possible to remove the graffiti without destroying the art underneath. It’s a massive, tragic loss to have it defaced to this degree.”

Koonalda Cave is located on the Nullarbor Plain, which is on the southern coast of Australia.

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