East Wallabi Island played an important role in the story of the Batavia shipwreck and massacre.

Following the shipwreck, a group of soldiers under the command of Wiebbe Hayes were put ashore on West Wallabi Island to search for water.

The mutineers, under the lead of Jeronimus Cornelisz, left Hayes' soldiers there in the hope that they would starve or die of thirst.

This platform, which arises abruptly from a flat shelf, is about 40 metres (130 ft) thick, and is of Quaternary origin.

These are discontinuous in western and northern parts of the island, but in the south-west and east they are extensive and consolidated.

Both the dunes and the pavement limestone support species-rich vegetation complexes dominated by chenopod shrubs, and these communities have been identified as having species conservation importance, because they are so diverse, yet so easily disturbed and so slow to recover.