The old Miri General Hospital, which was located on the peninsular at the Miri river mouth had long been operated by oil company Shell, with financial assistant from the government.
The HMS Viscount Melbourne was a three-mast, 800-ton sailing wooden ship about 150 feet long and 45 feet wide with brass sheathing that was journeying from Singapore to Macau in 1842 when she blown off course by a heavy storm and ultimately struck a reef in the Laconia Shoals, a large reef complex in South China Sea.