Bikini Atoll
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bikini Atoll (also known as Pikinni Atoll) is an uninhabited 6.0-square-kilometer atoll in one of the Micronesian Islands in the Pacific Ocean. It is a member of the Marshall Islands. It consists of 36 islands surrounding a 594.2-square-kilometer lagoon. As part of the Pacific Proving Grounds it was a site of more than 20 nuclear weapons tests between 1946 and 1958, including the first test of a practical hydrogen bomb in 1954.
The navigator and explorer Otto von Kotzebue named Bikini Atoll Eschscholtz Atoll after the scientist Johann Friedrich von Eschscholtz.
Preceding the nuclear tests, the indigenous population was relocated to Rongerik Atoll. The tests began in July 1946. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, some of the original islanders returned from Kili Island but were removed because of the high radioactivity.
For examination of the fallout, several rockets of the types Loki and Asp were launched at .
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[edit] Bikini Island
It is the northeasternmost and biggest island of Bikini Atoll. It is the most well-known and important island of the atoll, and measures about four kilometres. About twelve kilometres to the northwest is Aomen, the first island in that direction, and to the south of Bikini is Bukonfuaaku. Bikini Island is well-known for two reasons. First, it, along with the rest of the atoll, was subject to numerous nuclear bomb tests. Second, the bikini swimsuit was named after this island (or possibly the entire atoll).
Between 1946 and 1958, 23 nuclear devices were detonated at Bikini Atoll. One detonation on March 1, 1954, codenamed Castle Bravo, was the first test of a practical hydrogen bomb. The largest nuclear explosion ever set off by the United States, it created widespread radioactive contamination.
The Micronesian inhabitants, who numbered about 200 before the United States relocated them after World War II, ate fish, shellfish, bananas, and coconuts. In 1968 the United States declared Bikini habitable and started bringing the Bikinians back to their homes in the early 1970s. In 1978, however, the islanders were removed again when strontium-90 in their bodies reached dangerous levels. They sued the United States and were awarded $100 million in compensation. The clean-up operation would scrape off the top 16 inches of soil from the main island of Bikini, generating a million cubic feet of radioactive soil that could not be disposed of, at a cost that far exceeds this compensation award.
[edit] References in popular culture
- The author Theodore Taylor wrote a children's novel titled The Bomb, which told the story of a teenager's fight to prevent the first atom bomb from being dropped onto the atoll.
- The song "I Found That Essence Rare" by Gang of Four includes the lyrics:
- Aim for the body rare, you'll see it on TV
- The worst thing in 1954 was the Bikini
- See the girl on the TV dressed in a Bikini
- She doesn't think so but she's dressed for the H-Bomb[1]
- Big Boss, a villain in the Metal Gear video game series and the main character of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, is said to have been involved in the Bikini Atoll tests.
- SpongeBob SquarePants, a cartoon on Nickelodeon, takes place in a town known as Bikini Bottom which supposedly is under Bikini Atoll. In the episode "Dying for Pie", a bomb disguised as a pie violently explodes on impact with the Squidward character. Brief footage of the Crossroads BAKER A-Bomb test at Bikini is shown.
- In composer Steve Reich's video-opera Three Tales, the second act, "Bikini," recalls the nuclear tests at the island.
- A joke in the '50s asserted that "right next to Bikini Atoll is a famous nudist colony: No Bikini Atoll".
[edit] See also
- Bikini (a type of swimsuit named after the island)
- Flag of Bikini Atoll
- Operation Crossroads
- Operation Ivy
- Operation Castle
- Daigo Fukuryu Maru
- Bikini Bottom from SpongeBob SquarePants
[edit] External links
- A Short History of the People of Bikini Atoll
- Department of Energy Marshall Islands Program : Chronology of nuclear testing, relocation of islanders and results of radiation tests.
- Radio Bikini : Oscar-nominated 1987 documentary on the 1946 atomic bomb tests on Bikini Atoll and the effects on the Bikinians as well as the US sailors who witnessed the tests.
- Het Einde van de Wereld The End of the World (1995/VPRO-tv/Theo Uittenbogaard) a Dutch documentary on the history of the people of the island Rongelap, who were evacuated due to fallout from the Bikini nuclear tests and their hearing by a Senate Committee in Washington DC
- Annotated bibliography for Bikini Atoll from the Alsos Digital Library for Nuclear Issues
