The Shire of Esperance is a local government area in the Goldfields-Esperance region of Western Australia, about 400 kilometres (250 mi) south of the town of Kalgoorlie and about 720 kilometres (450 mi) east-southeast of the state capital, Perth. The Shire covers an area of 42,547 square kilometres (16,427 sq mi), and its seat of government is the town of Esperance, where about three-quarters of the Shire's population resides.

Skylab was the United States' first space station, launched by NASA, occupied for about 24 weeks between May 1973 and February 1974. It was operated by three trios of astronaut crews: Skylab 2, Skylab 3, and Skylab 4. Operations included an orbital workshop, a solar observatory, Earth observation and hundreds of experiments. Skylab's orbit eventually decayed and it disintegrated in the atmosphere on July 11, 1979, scattering debris across the Indian Ocean and Western Australia.