Bikini Atoll study

[Isabelle]

Hi Scubaboard divers,

I'm at student in the business school at UCLA and I am working on a non profit project for the atoll of Enewetak located in the Marshall Islands. We are conducting a study about the wreck diving site in the Bikini Atoll.

The results of the study would hopefully empower the local government of the Marshall Islands to make the Bikini wreck diving site more accessible to divers. We are trying to find divers who have dove Bikini or considered it but chosen other sites (Truuk, Palau etc...)

If you would willing to chat with us, please reach out to me via this site.

Kind regards,

Isabelle

 

[oldschoolto]

I'm all for Bikinis.....

Jim...

 

[flybigjet]

Thought about it, found out how hard it was to get there (they fired off Able and Baker precisely because it was pretty much the most isolated spot on the planet, after all), and chose Truk instead.

R.

"As soon as the war ended, we located the one spot on earth that hadn't been touched by the war and blew it to hell."
--Comedian Bob Hope commenting on Operation Crossroads

 

[WetPup]

^^^ This. Too hard to get there in the first place.

My brother has dived it, but he was passing through while he was in the Australian Navy. He has previously told me he wouldn't have ever dived it if it wasn't for the fact he was there on the ship.

 

[Kevrumbo]

Hi Scubaboard divers,

I'm at student in the business school at UCLA and I am working on a non profit project for the atoll of Enewetak located in the Marshall Islands. We are conducting a study about the wreck diving site in the Bikini Atoll.

The results of the study would hopefully empower the local government of the Marshall Islands to make the Bikini wreck diving site more accessible to divers. We are trying to find divers who have dove Bikini or considered it but chosen other sites (Truuk, Palau etc...)

If you would willing to chat with us, please reach out to me via this site.

Kind regards,

Isabelle

I dove Bikini Atoll in 2013, along with a back-to-back trip to Truk Lagoon.

At 888'/270m length, the Aircraft Carrier USS Saratoga requires a DPV Scooter to motor about on a full "grand tour" to see the entire wreck. Depth ranges from around 30m at the Flight Deck & passageway decks just below, to 55m max at where the bow meets the sand bottom.

Normally -other than the usual penetration hazards in deep wreck technical diving- as an external tour dive with good visibility & water clarity of 21m and 29deg C temp (June/July 2013), the only other hazard to be aware of are strong surface currents. Even with a scooter, it can be a physically demanding surface swim in CCR or OC twinsets & towing bailout/deco cylinders, jumping in from the stern of the liveaboard (M/V Winward) kicking to the bow mooring line; and then descending/pulling down along the mooring line to the carrier's flight deck level below at 27m.

And at 46 meters deep, diving at the Bridge of the HIJMS Nagato . . .where Admiral Yamamoto transmitted the most infamous code phrase in 20th Century History: Niitakayama Nobore ("Climb Mount Niitake"), the "Go Code" to Admiral Nagumo's flagship of the Kido Butai -at the time the most powerful carrier armada in the world- to attack the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The once powerful Battleship HIJMS Nagato, the first capital ship ever mounted with 16" guns, now capsized & bleeding fuel oil, the tall pagoda mast and Bridge superstructure smashed & bent lying on the sea floor: Symbolic Flagship of the Empire of Japan's destruction by the industrial might of the U.S. -and physically destroyed by the most powerful weapons ever developed & produced.

46 meters deep . . . worth to see and re-live the monumental history of it all.

Recommend contacting Pete Mesley, who runs yearly liveaboard charters to the "Atomic Fleet" at Bikini out of Kwajalein Atoll:

Bikini Atoll - Lust4Rust Wreck Diving Trips

 

[Peter69_56]

Hi, am wanting to go in 2017 but the cost is a problem along with the fact my wife cannot do liveaboards as she gets sea sick so she cannot go. If there was a land option more would come. Happy to talk further with you here or via email etc.

By comparison I have dived Truk 3 times and going again, Palau once and will never go back

 

[abnfrog]

I dove Bikini Atoll in 2013, along with a back-to-back trip to Truk Lagoon.

At 888'/270m length, the Aircraft Carrier USS Saratoga requires a DPV Scooter to motor about on a full "grand tour" to see the entire wreck. Depth ranges from around 30m at the Flight Deck & passageway decks just below, to 55m max at where the bow meets the sand bottom.

Normally -other than the usual penetration hazards in deep wreck technical diving- as an external tour dive with good visibility & water clarity of 21m and 29deg C temp (June/July 2013), the only other hazard to be aware of are strong surface currents. Even with a scooter, it can be a physically demanding surface swim in CCR or OC twinsets & towing bailout/deco cylinders, jumping in from the stern of the liveaboard (M/V Winward) kicking to the bow mooring line; and then descending/pulling down along the mooring line to the carrier's flight deck level below at 27m.

And at 46 meters deep, diving at the Bridge of the HIJMS Nagato . . .where Admiral Yamamoto transmitted the most infamous code phrase in 20th Century History: Niitakayama Nobore ("Climb Mount Niitake"), the "Go Code" to Admiral Nagumo's flagship of the Kido Butai -at the time the most powerful carrier armada in the world- to attack the US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The once powerful Battleship HIJMS Nagato, the first capital ship ever mounted with 16" guns, now capsized & bleeding fuel oil, the tall pagoda mast and Bridge superstructure smashed & bent lying on the sea floor: Symbolic Flagship of the Empire of Japan's destruction by the industrial might of the U.S. -and physically destroyed by the most powerful weapons ever developed & produced.

46 meters deep . . . worth to see and re-live the monumental history of it all.

Recommend contacting Pete Mesley, who runs yearly liveaboard charters to the "Atomic Fleet" at Bikini out of Kwajalein Atoll:

Bikini Atoll - Lust4Rust Wreck Diving Trips

did you dive with pete ? as i was on the second to last trip by bikini atoll divers in 2006.............

 

[wedivebc]

There used to be a dive facility there but it closed after Marshal Air stopped flying there.

 

[abnfrog]

There used to be a dive facility there but it closed after Marshal Air stopped flying there.

yeah that was when it stopped i was there in 2006

 

[billt4sf]

This might be an appropriate time to mention how the bikini (swim suit) was named.

It is my understanding that the two-piece suit came out for the first time about the time that the atoll was destroyed, and since the name was hanging about in pop culture, seemed to kind of fit (bi = two I guess) and was so used.

Do you still like bikinis, Jim? ha ha ha

- Bill