Arabian oryx towards Saudi Arabia, and by 1914, only a few survived outside that country. A few were reported in Jordan into the 1930s, but by the mid-1930s, the only remaining populations were in the Nafud Desert in northwestern Saudi Arabia and the Rub' al Khali in the south. In the 1930s, Arabian princes and oil company clerks started hunting Arabian oryx with automobiles and rifles. Hunts grew in size, and some were reported to employ as many as 300 vehicles. By the middle of the 20th century, the northern population was effectively extinct. The last Arabian oryx in the wild prior
Simpson Desert decades occurred during 2009-2010, and has seen the Simpson Desert burst into life and colour. In early March 2010, Birdsville recorded more rain in 24 hours than is usual in a whole year. Rain inundated Queensland’s north-west and Gulf regions. In total, 17 million megalitres of water entered the State’s western river systems leading to Lake Eyre. In 2010, researchers uncovered the courses of ancient river systems under the desert. The Simpson Desert is also a large part of the World Wildlife Fund ecoregion of the same name which consists of the Channel Country and the Simpson Strzelecki Dunefields bioregions