Bunyip animatronic

The Bunyip animatronic is an animatronic based on the Australian aboriginal mythical creature the Bunyip, located in Murray Bridge, South Australia.

Description

The animatronic is based on the aboriginal mythical creature called the Bunyip. The animatronic is in a pool of water in a small cave which has a cage in front of the cave to prevent people from jumping in the pool of water. Clicking a button is required to activate the animatronic which when clicked, the bunyip animatronic rises up from the pool of water, making growling, roaring sound effects. It goes up and downs many times before going back into the pool of water.

History

The Bunyip animatronic was built in 1972 by Dennis Newell, for the Murray Bridge Weerama Festival. The animatronic was completely covered by a wire cage instead of a cave, which previously costed twenty cents to operate the animatronic. About ten years later when the animatronic was built, the animatronic was renamed from Bert to Bertha, after the animatronic had a baby, which was attached to the animatronics right hand.

In the 1990s, the animatronics sound box was completely jammed which had let the sound box play the roaring sound for hours.

The original run-down animatronic, with the baby was entirely vandalised which ended up getting a whole new replacement in 2000, without the baby. At the time, the animatronic costed $1 before becoming a cost-free animatronic in 2018 that anyone can just press the button.

In 2023, the animatronic was replaced again due to a flood that happened from the Murray River back in 2022, when the flood happened, and the animatronic wasn't available, people could scan a QR code on their phones, which would then play an augmented reality bunyip which would rise up and down, just like the animatronic.

In popular culture

The animatronic has been compared with Submechanophobia on social media which is the fear of man-made submerged objects.

References