BIKINI RE-VISITED

crossroads +60
On October 12
,2005, my son and I made a 5 hour flight from Honolulu to Majuro
(capital of the Marshall Islands). The next day was a 2 hour flight to
Bikini Atoll with a brief stop at Kwajalein. We landed on a coral and
grass runway on Enyu island,where we were met by Bikini Divers and
transferred to Bikini island by boat. Bikini Divers is a semi-permanent
group catering primarily to scuba divers and consists of three dive
masters and 5 or 6 Marshallese. In addition to Bikini Divers, there is a
small U.S. Department of Energy group living on the island still testing
mainly things grown on the island as well as the water. Their claim is
that Bikini is the most tested island in the world. There are 10 or 12
buildings on Bikini housing the Bikini Divers,DOE personnel,Marshallese
workers, and visiting guests. Our quarters for the week were Spartan,
but clean and comfortable with airconditioning and hot showers. Power is
supplied to all of the facilities by two good sized generaters in a
separate building away from the housing. A supply ship delivers food,
fuel, and other necessities 3 or 4 time a year. This ship arrived during
our stay (3 months late) with many goodies, including fresh eggs. The
three meals per day were quite good even before the supply ship arrived,
thanks to a large walk-in freezer. There was also no shortage of fresh
water supplied by a desalinization plant. Bikini island looked much like
it did 59 years ago,but has more breadfruit and pandanus trees. As you
may recall,Able and Baker tests did little damage to the islands. The
Bravo test in 1954, which was 1000 times the power of Able and Baker,
however, levelled just about all of the trees on the atoll. Bikini
island was then bulldozed and cleared of all vegetation. Coconut palm
trees were planted in the 1970's and are now full grown. Most of these
were planted in straight lines in grids over the island but are very
appealing to the eye. There is no sign of the camera towers erected in
1946 by the 53rd Seabees, but there are several large concrete bunkers
built probably for Bravo,one of which we viewed inside.The smaller
islands in the atoll were not re-planted and have very few palm trees.
They are thickly covered with breadfruit, pandanus,and other trees and
shrubs. Eddie,a very personable Marshallese whose grandfather was one of
the Bikinian moved off the island, took my son and me on a boat trip to
the outer islands and we went ashore on Eman island (Eneman), where I
lived for about 3 months in 1946 with a weather station contingent of 8
people (2 Air Force officers, 3 AF enlisted men, 1 Coxwain, and two
Seabees including myself. The station made daily weather
reports to Kwajalein for the B-29's making practice runs on an Erik
island target. That brought back many memories of swimming,fishing for
sharks, beachcombing,and tent living. The scuba divers went out twice a
day to dive on,around, an in the Saratoga CV3, Japanese battleship
Nagato, battleship USS Arkansas, and other ships and submarines at the
bottom of the lagoon.My son and I did not dive as it is no place for a
novice diver. They were down 150-180 feet most days. We did, however,
snorkle above the Saratoga and could see the outline of her
superstructure. The Bikinians evacuated in 1946 to Rongerik, or their
descendants are now living mostly on Kili Atoll. The Marshallese now
working on Bikini are mostly from Majuro and return there once or twice
a year. All in all it was a thoroughly enjoyable trip, although my son
was a little bit antsy because of the isolation and remoteness of
Bikini. No telephones,TV, Internet or other contact with the outside
world. There was a satellite telephone available for emergency use and a
TV for showing of videos and DVD's.
******************************************************************************************************************
FYI--For anyone interested in reading about Crossroads the book
"Operation Crossroads" by Jonathan M. Weisgall is an excellent account
of that time. You may find it in your local library.
*********************************************************You may also
find a lot of information about Bikini and Bikini Divers at
bikiniatoll.com
********************************************************* Walter B.
Kropf Phm2/c 53rd Seabees,1946
Powered by MSN TV

v