Steve Irwin Gets A Touching Campfire Goodbye

Steve Irwin spent thousands of nights of his life in the middle of the Australian bush, jungles, rainforests and deserts. When he wasn't tracking crocodiles and nocturnals by torchlight, he enjoyed sitting around a fire, chatting with his wife, his camera crew, his friends, or just listening to the sounds of the night wilderness.

So it's wonderfully fitting, then, that as part of the farewell for Steve, his family and friends gave him a send-off around a campfire.

From the Sydney Morning Herald :

On Saturday, (Steve's wife and kids) were among a small group of family and friends who took part in a funeral in the grounds of Mr Irwin`s Australia Zoo.

Bob Irwin, the wildlife celebrity's father, told a media conference today that the intimate farewell "was held just like he would have wanted with everyone telling their favourite stories about him around a candlelit fire.

Soon after his death, the Irwin family turned down offers by the Queensland and Federal Governments for a state funeral, saying he had regarded himself as "just an ordinary bloke" who would not have wanted such a fuss being made.

A PETA spokesman was asked for his thoughts on Steve Irwin as a conservationist, and on the way he lost his life. Not much sympathy here :

“It comes as no shock at all that Steve Irwin should die provoking a dangerous animal....He made a career out of antagonizing frightened wild animals, which is a very dangerous message to send to kids.”

“If you compare him with a responsible conservationist like Jacques Cousteau, he looks like a cheap reality TV star.”

Cheap? Far from it.

Steve didn't blow his money staging demos and handing out leaflets to mostly disinterested people to promote his cause. He did something that obviously shocked PETA. He made his education of children to all things environmental FUN.

Yeah, PETA's idea of a "responsible conservationist" obviously doesn't include someone like Steve who spent millions of dollars buying up tens of thousands of acres of wilderness across Australia and the US, and a few Pacific Islands, to ensure vast pristine tracts of endangered animal environments will be protected forever.

Does that sound like a "responsible conservationist" to you? Hell, no!


Steve's sudden death has apparently shocked the hell out of the Jackass team, no strangers to throwing themselves in amongst the some of the most dangerous animals on the planet.

Here's Johnny Knoxville's reaction :

"God bless Steve Irwin. All the guys were really upset about that. We had so much respect and love for the guy.

"We were all talking about it and thought, 'If he's going to go it's the way he'd want to go'. He's got kids and that's horrible, but he was doing what he loved.

"I know it's cliche, but if there's any man who was doing what he loved it was Steve."

It ain't a cliche when it's that true.

One member of Jackass, Steve-O has been so shocked by the death of Irwin that he's thinking about throwing in his own blood-soaked encounters with some of the most dangerous animals on the planet :

"I think I'm generally going to close the book on wildlife encounters,"

Steve-O had a nasty brush with death recently when he offered himself up as 'human bait' to a Mako shark during the filming of a Jackass movie. The Mako nearly took his leg off. He managed to kick it away in time.

The 'Crocodile Hunter' Is Being Remembered, And Celebrated, Right Around The World

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Freak Death Of Steve Irwin Caught On Video

Russell Crowe On Irwin : "The Ultimate Wildlife Warrior"

By Darryl Mason

Steve Irwin boasted in 2003 that television cameras follow him around and capture almost every second of each day in his life.

It is then, not surprising, that Irwin's sudden death has been caught on any number of cameras, and not just those that were vidding him for a new TV series on Australia's deadliest creatures (the irony would have made him laugh long and loud, no doubt).

A camera crew caught the moment when a 2.5 metre long stingray pierced his heart, but tourists on a reef cruise nearby also captured the frantic attempts to revive this legendary Australian on the deck of a boat.

Right now, Queensland police are reviewing the video of the moment the stingray pumped venom straight into his heart, bringing on cardiac arrest.

It will only be a matter of time before the videos of tourists pop up online.

For a man who lived his life so publicly, should the moment of his death be private, or shared with those who wish to view it, regardless of how traumatic the footage of a dying man may be?

From news.com :

"The footage shows him swimming in the water, the ray stopped and turned and that was it," said boatowner Peter West, who viewed the footage afterwards.

"There was no blood in the water, it was not that obvious ... something happened with this animal that made it rear and he was at the wrong position at the wrong time and if it hit him anywhere else we would not be talking about a fatality."

Stingrays the size of the one that killed Irwin have a spike on the end of their tale, described as being "like a dagger", 20cm long. It seems likely now that Irwin may have died almost instantly.

Spear fisherman and fellow film-maker Ben Cropp has a few more details on what happened :

"He was up in the shallow water, probably 1.5m to 2m deep, following a bull ray which was about a metre across the body - probably weighing about 100kg, and it had quite a large spine. The cameraman was filming in the water."

Mr Cropp said the stingray was spooked and went into defensive mood.

"It probably felt threatened because Steve was alongside and there was the cameraman ahead, and it felt there was danger and it baulked.

"It stopped and went into a defensive mode and swung its tail with the spike.

"Steve unfortunately was in a bad position and copped it.

"I have had that happen to me, and I can visualise it - when a ray goes into defensive, you get out of the way.

"Steve was so close he could not get away, so if you can imagine it - being right beside the ray and it swinging its spine upwards from underneath Steve - and it hit him..."

Millions of Americans, like Australians, like people across the planet, have gone into a state of shock over the sudden death of Irwin.

Irwin once explained to US TV host Jay Leno how he goes about determining whether a crocodile is male or female :

"I put my finger in here and if it smiles, it's a girl," Irwin said. "If it bites me, it's a boy."

Interesting bit of info on just how valuable an entertainment icon Irwin was viewed as in the US

He was being wooed by cashed up Las Vegas casinos willing to pay a reported $US50 million to perform nightly, long-term shows.

Hard to imagine such a lover of the outdoors and animals in their natural state would have ever commited to a Las Vegas strip show, that would have kept in the desert city for months on end.

The RSPCA said Irwin was like "a modern day Noah" due to his devotion to conservation causes and efforts to save endangered Australian fauna :

"His loss will be felt by animal lovers not just in Australia but all over the world," said RSPCA Queensland chief executive Mark Townend.

RSPCA Queensland spokesman Michael Beatty, who first worked with Irwin when the Crocodile Hunter was just 15, said Irwin's contribution to society would only truly be recognised in the years ahead.

"He put his money where his mouth was," Mr Beatty said.

"Other people talked about it, Steve did it.

"His television series inspired millions of people all over the world to not only appreciate and understand wildlife, but to become active in the conservation movement.

"Whether he was speaking to global leaders or ordinary Australians, Steve Irwin told it like it was.

"His death truly is a tragedy.

"Wildlife has lost its most vocal champion," Mr Beatty said.

Australian actor Russell Crowe says goodbye to his mate :

He was the Australian we all aspire to be. He held an absolute belief that caring for the richness of our country, meaning specifically the riches of our fauna, was the highest priority we should have. And, over time, we might just see how right he was.

He was and remains, the ultimate wildlife warrior. He touched my heart. I believed in him. I'll miss him. I loved him and I will be there for his family.

His manager and close friend, John Stainton, says goodbye :

"The world has lost a great wildlife icon, a passionate conservationist and one of the proudest dads on the planet. He died doing what he loved best and left this world in a happy and peaceful state of mind. He would have said, 'Crocs Rule!'"

Internet forums across the world are steadily filling with millions of tributes, goodbyes and words of praise for Irwin and his work. It's truly remarkable. It's easily the most volumuous outpouring of public grief and affection since the death of Princess Diana.

The news.com forum in Australia has logged more than 3000 comments in less than eight hours since the news of his death hit the headlines. The CrocodileHunter.com homepage has been down for hours due to the millions of people trying to reach the site to say their goodbyes.

Hopefully Irwin's most important message to all of us will never be forgotten.

Treat the Earth with respect and love and conserve it for future generations.

After all, it's the only one we've got.

The Wit & Wisdom Of Steve Irwin, Wildlife Warrior

By Darryl Mason

He was a genuine, true blue Australian. He loved his wife, adored his kids, he lived his dreams and he never tried to hide who he really was. Steve Irwin also happened to be one of the biggest stars on the planet, and one of the most famous Australians in our short history.

Few know that he wrote a series of widely admired scientific papers on Australian fauna and died as one of the largest private landowners in Australia - he used his millions to buy up tens of thousands of acres of pristine Australian bush and rainforest, never to be developed, never to be touched. That's putting your money where your mouth is and putting those hard-earned dollars to a wonderfully good use.

Some Australians found him a little hard to take, he was maybe too Australian in his honesty and his vocabulary, but it was probably his unbound enthusiasm and energy that grated on the nerves of some of his fellow countrymen.

But the kids loved him. Absolutely loved him.

There's been quite a few comments from Australian bloggers who were in the US in 2000 and 2001, as I was, who were stunned to learn about this Crocodile Hunter that seemingly every American loved and couldn't stop talking about.

But how many Australians knew who he was back then? Not many.

If he was known at all by the masses in Australia it was as the over-the-top, hammy host of a kids afternoon TV show.

But in the US? Mega-star. I lost track of the amount of times Americans said, "Oh, you're an Australian? Can you say 'Crikey! Look at the size of this fella!" or variations on that theme.

Okay, and onto the subject of this post.

Steve Irwin, as well as being Australia's most enthusiastic conservationist, was also quite the philosopher, and stand-up comic, as well as a storyteller of immense talent.

Here's a selection of quotes from some of the longer, in-depth television interviews Steve Irwin gave during 2003 and 2004.

Read them and think of his voice and add the energy and laughter.

It's interesting how different these quotes read to hearing them come out of his mouth on television. Some of them seem far more powerful in type.

Quick note on the first quote : Irwin had a big problem with entreprenuers who called themselves conservationists but promoted crocodile farming (for meat and skins). Same with kangaroos. He wanted to save all Australian animals, all the time.

They're on some crusade, these wildlife perpetrating people, where they think that, you know, by eating crocodiles and whales that we'll actually save the world, and that is bullshit, and that is bad, and it is something that must stop, and it is something that I fight vehemently.

Just say what you're gonna say, mate.

I'm fair dinkum, like kangaroos and Land Cruisers, winged keels and bloody flies! I think we've lost all that. I think we've all become very, sort of, money people.

If you don't have your highs and your lows, then you're just going to have a pretty mundane sort of a boring life and and my highs are really really high and my lows are really really low...

And then you've got the detractors having a go at me. You know, "Taking tourism back to the Stone Age." It seems to me that they're actually trying to promote nice beaches, cosmopolitan cities, cafe latte. That's in every country. What haven't they got? They haven't got kangaroos, haven't got koalas, haven't got saltwater crocs, mate.

I've got a photo of my daughter and I can just sit there and start crying just looking at her. Who would have thought someone as ugly as me could bring into the world something so beautiful, such a treasure?

I think I've actually got animals so genetically inside me that there's no way I could actually be anything else. I think my path would have always gone back to or delivered me to wildlife. I think wildlife is just like a magnet, and it's something that I can't help.


You know, easily the greatest threat to the wildlife globally is the destruction and annihilation of habitat. So I've gone, "Right, well, how do I fix that? Well, making a quid here. People are keen to give me money over there. I'll buy it. I'll buy habitat."...

There's too many good ones. I'll post another round-up, or you can read the interview transcripts in full for yourself, here and here and here