“I have no fear of losing my life. If I have to save a koala or a crocodile or a kangaroo or a snake, mate, I will save it.” – Steve Irwin

Steve Irwin who once devoted time in the hunt for the Thylacine has been killed. Crikey!

Irwin, the hugely popular Australian television personality and conservationist known as the "Crocodile Hunter," was killed Monday, September 4, 2006, by a stingray while filming off the Great Barrier Reef. He was 44.

Irwin was at Batt Reef, off the remote coast of northeastern Queensland state, shooting a segment for a series called "Ocean’s Deadliest" when he swam too close to one of the animals, which have a poisonous barb on their tails, his friend and colleague John Stainton said.

"He came on top of the stingray and the stingray’s barb went up and into his chest and put a hole into his heart," said Stainton, who was on board Irwin’s boat at the time.

Irwin appears to have had a mild interest in cryptozoology. In August 6, 2002, Irwin was on the radio talk show, "Coast to Coast AM with George Noory." Noory asked Irwin about the Yowie/Bigfoot and Irwin replied that he had traveled extensively and hadn’t seen anything. He felt that he might have seen something by now, if they were real.

Additionally, Steve Irwin had gone on expeditions in search of Thylacine, although he reportedly had found no physical sightings. Nevertheless, he would tell people that there are some areas so remote that it is difficult to explore them fully and that if there is a small population of Thylacine they could easily go undiscovered. (For more about the Thylacine/Tasmanian Tiger, see “70 Years: Thylacines Still Rule!”.)

Good-bye, mate.

Our thoughts are with his kids, wife, family, and friends.

Update

Animal Planet is running repeats of the biographical episodes of “Crocodile Hunter” and other tributes all day, Labor Day, September 4, 2006.