Scuba Jim
Contributor
Wednesday 14 May 2003
We all staggered out of bed at around 5.00am and gathered bleary eyed in the reception at the Outrigger. Gear for storage was set aside by the reception desk and everything else was loaded on the luggage lorry. We clambered into the bus and headed off to the airport.
"Now, Ian, are you SURE you have everything? Are you sure you did not bring the baggage you wanted to leave behind, and left your dive gear & camera stuff at the Outrigger? Good."
We arrived at the airport at 6.00am, the sun just beginning to peep over the horizon. There were a few light clouds dotted about the sky, but things looked encouraging. We loitered until about 6.15am when the check-in staff from Air Marshall Islands decided to make an appearance. Luggage was checked, and some were charged for the excess, some were not. I for one had decided not to have any carry on to see if I could get away with not paying excess baggage. Having weighed my dive bag in at 43lbs (they allow 30lbs for free) I decided that my camera case could be my carry on (25lbs!) and hid it round the corner!! For some strange reason I did not get charged for the 13lbs of excess baggage, but some did, and it appeared for only the outbound flight. Being the honest chap that I am I didn't tell the others that I had not been charged for excess baggage. Perhaps he read the scales wrong and thought it said 33lbs? Anyway, I got away with it! Phew!
Luggage headed off round the back and we walked out onto the tarmac and boarded our plane. Now, have you ever been on a Dornier? Compact and bijou is the phrase I would have used A single row of seats down each side, a row of 3 at the back, no creature comforts and a noisy journey was in stall for us. I knew, I had done it before! We taxied all the way to the end of the runway and with the engines revving we headed off at full tilt back towards the other end of the airport. We gathered speed would we make it off the ground before we hit a palm tree? We gathered yet more speed the front wheel lifted the back wheels lifted We were pushed back in our seats as the pilot pulled the stick back hard and we hurled into the lightening sky!
We banked steeply and headed north west across Majuro Lagoon. Below was Kapalin Pass, where the others had dived before. Clouds started building up as we headed off across the open ocean (not a good sign!), and an hour and 15 minutes later we arrived at Kwajalein.
The airport at Kwajalein - now you have seen this top secret site, I am afraid I'm going to have to kill you all.
Kwajalein is the world's largest atoll (but of course you would know that if you had been reading earlier parts of my report!). It is a sort of top secret US military base, even though most of the people who work there are civilian contractors. ICBMs are test fired from the W Coast of the USA into Kwaj atoll to make sure they are aiming correctly. Dont worry, though, they're not armed! If you sit on the correct side of the plane (and this depends on which direction the plane is landing or taking off) you can see the German battlecruiser Prinz Eugen lying upside down with her props sticking out of the water off the lagoon side of the island of Ebeye, next to Kwaj. (If you are landing from the east, sit on the left hand side of the plane, as you will see it at take off. If you are landing from the west, sit on the right hand side of the plane on landing. There you are, now you know!)
The island of Ebeye.
The Eugen was used at the Bikini tests, and I always joke zat becoss of zee high kvality Cherman engineering zee atom bombs did not zink zee ship, yah. In fact, they managed to tow the ship all the way to Kwaj before she started listing; they towed her into shallow water to beach her, but she capsized before she got there. Her bow sticks out over the edge of the lagoon drop-off, and her stern pokes out of the water. Three of her props are still there, but the other is now in a museum in Bremen, if I am not mistaken. Anyway, it is a nice little aside from the boredom of looking at the sea for an hour!
Prinz Eugen, upside down at Ebeye.
The plane refuels at Kwaj, and you are frog marched into a waiting room and guarded by official looking types with guns on their hips. You wanna pee? Someone goes with you. You wanna snack? They'll shoot you ask what that building over there is! Actually, it's not quite that bad, but they certainly see transit tourists as a monumental pain in the behind. I believe the staff here also went to the US Customs & Immigration School of Charm for Intensive Training in How to Be Unfriendly. Still, it does allow you to see the wall displays in the "transit lounge" of what happened in the Marshalls during WW2. Half an hour later the plane is refuelled and we march back out to the plane. This time we take off to the east so miss the Eugen, but immediately swing round to the north and then west and head out over the centre of Kwaj atoll. To say Kwaj atoll is enormous is an understatement. Flying at 175 knots, as we were, takes almost an hour to get from one end of the atoll to the other. The reef from the air looks superb and incredibly interesting. The passes into the lagoon no doubt offer fabulous and untouched diving. Even in the centre of the lagoon, which is 200ft deep, coral pinnacles rise straight to the surface. I know there are lots of wrecks in Kwaj atoll, but the problem is most of the place is off limits to the general public by virtue of its top secretedness and off limitsness. That's enough nesses for the moment. The day this place opens up for diving big time, I'll be there!
Yummy looking reef at Kwajalein.
We leave Kwaj behind and head off again over the Pacific. An hour and an alf after take off Bikini comes into site. We land on the second largest island, Enyu, on the WW2 runway. This runway was originally tarmac, but has been encroached by weeds and the like, and while it is plenty long enough for wide bodied jets, the surface isnt. Decanting from the plane we are greeted by the dive team at Bikini, plus the departing guests, all from Hawaii. A small problem now posed itself to the departing guests. How to get all their clobber in the little plane, having arrived on the big one! Well, it seems that obviously Air Marshall Islands has been playing everyone for fools for a long time, as they chucked the whole lot on without a "Hmmmm, that's too much luggage." They headed off into the sky and we walked the 100 yards to the dock, me teasing everyone by saying "Don't touch that, it's radioactive. Dont touch that, it'll make your doodle fall off." And other chucklesome phrases.
We've arrived at Bikini!
Luggage was loaded into one boat and we loaded into another, and 45 minutes later we arrived at the dock on Bikini Island proper. We then proceeded by mini bus to the resort area.
The resort is split into 2 accommodation blocks, one with 4 twin rooms, and 1 with 4 single rooms. Each have an ensuite bathroom with shower and can. It's clean and comfortable, but it ain't luxurious!
The Ritz it ain't!
There is a separate dining area and also a TV room and a sort of sitting room area which at present is not very comfortable - a few sofas would not go amiss!
Resort area from the sea.
However, wjhat is lacking on the creature comfort front is made up for by the spectacular beach.
Look at all those people on the beach!
A late breakfast, early lunch, call it what you will, was served, and we then retired to our rooms to get our clothes and dive gear sorted. Clothes took 1 minute, dive gear 10, and camera 30. I know how to get my priorities prioritised!
Now, before I go into the diving side of things ("Boohoo" I hear you cry!) I thought I would give you a quick 5 minute potted history of what happened at Bikini. So hear goes:
1945: US develops the atom bomb. Tests it in New Mexico and drops 2 on Japan. For 2 reasons: 1. So as NOT to have to invade Japan and make them surrender and 2. As a little warning to them darn Commies in Rusky land.
1946. US finds a remote and sparsely inhabited island in the Marshall group, throws off 167 natives "for the good of mankind" and arranges to test three nuclear bombs on various obsolete and captured WW2 ships to see what they would do to them. The operation was known as Operation Crossroads, because mankind was, it seemed, at a nuclear crossroad.
"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 said operation.
This was not only the US showing off its might, but also an internal ding-dong between the navy and the newly formed Air Force (the air force having previously been part of the army). First drop is an air drop, by the air force, on 1 July. A 20kt device similar to that used on Japan, it lands 600 yards off target, which is why most of the films and fotos of it are off centre! It was "not very impressive" to the thousands of people observing. It did sink a few small ships, but the bigguns survived to tell the tale. For the next 3 weeks people scrambled over them, LIVED in them and all built up nice doses of radiation, thank you very much indeed.
On 25 July the navy, having suspended a similar device 90ft below the surface of the sea, set off their little baby. Kaboom! A much more impressive display, it has to be said. This explosion not only looked amazing, it also dumped serious amounts of radiation on the ships and on Bikini. Those that are now at the bottom of the lagoon sank, some, like the Eugen got towed to Kwaj and sank and some were returned to the US and were broken up or sued for target practice.
25 July 1946 - "For the Good of Mankind" according to the US Government
The resulting data was used for scientific purposes to determine the future of nuclear weapons and Bikini was abandoned. (Remember, there were to be 3 tests! Just keeping you on your toes!)
Now, the people of Bikini assumed that they would be able to return to their island soon after the tests had finished, but obviously they had not been told about the radiation. They were subsequently banished from their island until it was safe to return. As you will know, they are yet to do so, and most are currently living on the island of Kili. I think it safer for me not to get into the politics of the whole things, so I will leave that to your own research!
Now, remember, there were to be 3 tests at Bikini .
Things were pretty quiet until 1948, when Truman authorised a series of tests because Cold War tensions were increasing and the only stockpiles of weapons that the US had were based on the design of the Trinity test, as used in Japan and at Bikini. These tests were to take place at Enewetak, also in the Marshalls. Subsequently, there were 7 more "Operations" at Enewetak and at the Nevada test site, including, in 1952, Operation Ivy, where the US started developing a hydrogen bomb - a thermonuclear device. The Mike test at Enewetak on I November 1952 was that test, and this paved the way for Operation Castle in 1954, to take place on Bikini.
Now, don't forget, there were to be 3 tests at Bikini .
Having built a hydrogen bomb at Enewetak that was about the size of a house, the US started trying to redesign the bomb to make it deliverable by air.
On 1 March 1954 the US tested their third bomb at Bikini - the Bravo. This was the first dry or solid fuel hydrogen bomb, filled with lithium deuteride, and was the largest bomb EVER set off by the US. In fact, it resulted in an explosion almost 3 times greater than expected, due to the tritium provided by the lithium-7 isotope which made up most of the lithium. Coming in at a whopping 15 megatons (that's 15 million tons of TNT equivalent, compared with only 20 thousand tons for the 1946 tests and those in Japan), the bomb vaporised 3 islands, blew a hole 250ft deep and 6500ft in diameter in the atoll. The resulting mushroom cloud rose 130,000ft into the air, and drifted across the atolls of Rongerik, Rongelap, Ailinginae and Utirik because the powers that be could not be bothered to wait for the prevailing winds to blow the radioactivity away from islands of inhabitation, but rather wanted to set the thing off on the day they had planned. This was to be the worst radiological disaster in US history. The entire atoll was contaminated, and the exclusion zone around the test was increased to 570,000 sq miles, a circle 850 miles in diameter.
01 March 1954 - the world's first solid fuel thermonuclear device goes off
The Americans had got their 3 tests in at Bikini and their thinking was, well the place is totally uninhabitable now, let's nuke it to buggery!
In the space of 2 and a half months from 1 March to 14 May 1954, the Americans dropped 48 megatons of bombs on Bikini. By 1958, when they finished, the total was nearer 75 megatons. Three cheers for the Americans!
The Bikinians then started asking questions such as:
Q: "What the hell have you done to our island?"
A: Err nuked it
Q: "When can we go back?"
A: Aah, ummm, well, not for a VERY long time, I am afraid.
Q: "Can we sue you?"
A: Oh, darn, shoot
So various trust funds were set up for the Bikinians, and they have been living off them every since. A few families returned to Bikini in the 70s but soon became ill, and since then they have never really trusted anything the Americans will say to them about whether it is or is not safe to return.
The main reason that they cant go back is because there is Caesium in the soil, and the coconut & pandanus palms and breadfruit trees, their main staple diet, take up caesium instead of potassium, and irradiate their fruit. The coconut crabs that also eat the coconuts, have taken the caesium into their bodies. Bikinians like eating coconut crabs. The ground water is also contaminated. So all their "land" food is unfit to eat.
Anyway, Bikini was "abandoned" for a few decades, and in the late 80s a feasibility study was done on the wrecks to see if the place could be turned into a sort of marine park where divers pay money to see them. The rest, as they say, is history.
Anyway, that's enough history for one day. There'll be test next week.
So, the diving. Well, firstly, people assume the diving in Bikini is deep and dangerous, and is some sort of tech diver's dream. Well, I'd like to blow that preconception out of the window immediately. The dives ARE deeper than you can do on Nitrox (except the check-out dive on the Saratoga), so you dive on air, and you decompress on a Nitrox mix that varies from 74-80%. The Nitrox is fed to a deco station suspended under the dive tender by way of whips - each diver has their own whip.
Decostation!
So, you do the dive on air and the deco on Nitrox. Simple! Most of the dives are in the 130-170ft range. You can dive on single 15l steels with single or twin valves or twin aluminium tanks (please not correct spelling of aluminium, Americans!) with isolation manifolds. That is more than enough air for you to do both the dive AND decompress if, for some reason the mooring line had bust and the tender had drifted off. If you have a computer that allows you to switch gas mixes underwater (Nitek Diverite3 or Suunto Vitek, for instance), then you can speed up your decompression. Otherwise you have to stay on air on the computer and hang for some time on the deco station. It does not cut back on the length of the dive itself, just makes it longer to get out of the water. Dives with switchable computers can expect to be off gassed in about half the time it takes for a diver on an air computer. Some computers just won't work there - cheap "sport diving" computers for instance. You do need something a little more heavy duty.
The island only takes 11 divers, so the group is split into 2, with a 15 minute interval between each group entering the water. There is a guide with each group, though not all the dives are "guided" as such. Tim Williams, the guy in charge, is a good photographer and knows what it is like to pose for divers - if you do not have a buddy and want someone to pose for you, he's your man!
All the wrecks are located no more than about 20 minutes from the resort.
Here's a map to orientate yourselves.
And here's a picture of the dive tender, if you're interested Its called Able Baker, after the two bombs in 1946.
Dive boat.
Anyway, as this posting has become quite long, I'll post the waffle about the dives on another posting, as this may become rather long winded!
We all staggered out of bed at around 5.00am and gathered bleary eyed in the reception at the Outrigger. Gear for storage was set aside by the reception desk and everything else was loaded on the luggage lorry. We clambered into the bus and headed off to the airport.
"Now, Ian, are you SURE you have everything? Are you sure you did not bring the baggage you wanted to leave behind, and left your dive gear & camera stuff at the Outrigger? Good."
We arrived at the airport at 6.00am, the sun just beginning to peep over the horizon. There were a few light clouds dotted about the sky, but things looked encouraging. We loitered until about 6.15am when the check-in staff from Air Marshall Islands decided to make an appearance. Luggage was checked, and some were charged for the excess, some were not. I for one had decided not to have any carry on to see if I could get away with not paying excess baggage. Having weighed my dive bag in at 43lbs (they allow 30lbs for free) I decided that my camera case could be my carry on (25lbs!) and hid it round the corner!! For some strange reason I did not get charged for the 13lbs of excess baggage, but some did, and it appeared for only the outbound flight. Being the honest chap that I am I didn't tell the others that I had not been charged for excess baggage. Perhaps he read the scales wrong and thought it said 33lbs? Anyway, I got away with it! Phew!
Luggage headed off round the back and we walked out onto the tarmac and boarded our plane. Now, have you ever been on a Dornier? Compact and bijou is the phrase I would have used A single row of seats down each side, a row of 3 at the back, no creature comforts and a noisy journey was in stall for us. I knew, I had done it before! We taxied all the way to the end of the runway and with the engines revving we headed off at full tilt back towards the other end of the airport. We gathered speed would we make it off the ground before we hit a palm tree? We gathered yet more speed the front wheel lifted the back wheels lifted We were pushed back in our seats as the pilot pulled the stick back hard and we hurled into the lightening sky!
We banked steeply and headed north west across Majuro Lagoon. Below was Kapalin Pass, where the others had dived before. Clouds started building up as we headed off across the open ocean (not a good sign!), and an hour and 15 minutes later we arrived at Kwajalein.
The airport at Kwajalein - now you have seen this top secret site, I am afraid I'm going to have to kill you all.
Kwajalein is the world's largest atoll (but of course you would know that if you had been reading earlier parts of my report!). It is a sort of top secret US military base, even though most of the people who work there are civilian contractors. ICBMs are test fired from the W Coast of the USA into Kwaj atoll to make sure they are aiming correctly. Dont worry, though, they're not armed! If you sit on the correct side of the plane (and this depends on which direction the plane is landing or taking off) you can see the German battlecruiser Prinz Eugen lying upside down with her props sticking out of the water off the lagoon side of the island of Ebeye, next to Kwaj. (If you are landing from the east, sit on the left hand side of the plane, as you will see it at take off. If you are landing from the west, sit on the right hand side of the plane on landing. There you are, now you know!)
The island of Ebeye.
The Eugen was used at the Bikini tests, and I always joke zat becoss of zee high kvality Cherman engineering zee atom bombs did not zink zee ship, yah. In fact, they managed to tow the ship all the way to Kwaj before she started listing; they towed her into shallow water to beach her, but she capsized before she got there. Her bow sticks out over the edge of the lagoon drop-off, and her stern pokes out of the water. Three of her props are still there, but the other is now in a museum in Bremen, if I am not mistaken. Anyway, it is a nice little aside from the boredom of looking at the sea for an hour!
Prinz Eugen, upside down at Ebeye.
The plane refuels at Kwaj, and you are frog marched into a waiting room and guarded by official looking types with guns on their hips. You wanna pee? Someone goes with you. You wanna snack? They'll shoot you ask what that building over there is! Actually, it's not quite that bad, but they certainly see transit tourists as a monumental pain in the behind. I believe the staff here also went to the US Customs & Immigration School of Charm for Intensive Training in How to Be Unfriendly. Still, it does allow you to see the wall displays in the "transit lounge" of what happened in the Marshalls during WW2. Half an hour later the plane is refuelled and we march back out to the plane. This time we take off to the east so miss the Eugen, but immediately swing round to the north and then west and head out over the centre of Kwaj atoll. To say Kwaj atoll is enormous is an understatement. Flying at 175 knots, as we were, takes almost an hour to get from one end of the atoll to the other. The reef from the air looks superb and incredibly interesting. The passes into the lagoon no doubt offer fabulous and untouched diving. Even in the centre of the lagoon, which is 200ft deep, coral pinnacles rise straight to the surface. I know there are lots of wrecks in Kwaj atoll, but the problem is most of the place is off limits to the general public by virtue of its top secretedness and off limitsness. That's enough nesses for the moment. The day this place opens up for diving big time, I'll be there!
Yummy looking reef at Kwajalein.
We leave Kwaj behind and head off again over the Pacific. An hour and an alf after take off Bikini comes into site. We land on the second largest island, Enyu, on the WW2 runway. This runway was originally tarmac, but has been encroached by weeds and the like, and while it is plenty long enough for wide bodied jets, the surface isnt. Decanting from the plane we are greeted by the dive team at Bikini, plus the departing guests, all from Hawaii. A small problem now posed itself to the departing guests. How to get all their clobber in the little plane, having arrived on the big one! Well, it seems that obviously Air Marshall Islands has been playing everyone for fools for a long time, as they chucked the whole lot on without a "Hmmmm, that's too much luggage." They headed off into the sky and we walked the 100 yards to the dock, me teasing everyone by saying "Don't touch that, it's radioactive. Dont touch that, it'll make your doodle fall off." And other chucklesome phrases.
We've arrived at Bikini!
Luggage was loaded into one boat and we loaded into another, and 45 minutes later we arrived at the dock on Bikini Island proper. We then proceeded by mini bus to the resort area.
The resort is split into 2 accommodation blocks, one with 4 twin rooms, and 1 with 4 single rooms. Each have an ensuite bathroom with shower and can. It's clean and comfortable, but it ain't luxurious!
The Ritz it ain't!
There is a separate dining area and also a TV room and a sort of sitting room area which at present is not very comfortable - a few sofas would not go amiss!
Resort area from the sea.
However, wjhat is lacking on the creature comfort front is made up for by the spectacular beach.
Look at all those people on the beach!
A late breakfast, early lunch, call it what you will, was served, and we then retired to our rooms to get our clothes and dive gear sorted. Clothes took 1 minute, dive gear 10, and camera 30. I know how to get my priorities prioritised!
Now, before I go into the diving side of things ("Boohoo" I hear you cry!) I thought I would give you a quick 5 minute potted history of what happened at Bikini. So hear goes:
1945: US develops the atom bomb. Tests it in New Mexico and drops 2 on Japan. For 2 reasons: 1. So as NOT to have to invade Japan and make them surrender and 2. As a little warning to them darn Commies in Rusky land.
1946. US finds a remote and sparsely inhabited island in the Marshall group, throws off 167 natives "for the good of mankind" and arranges to test three nuclear bombs on various obsolete and captured WW2 ships to see what they would do to them. The operation was known as Operation Crossroads, because mankind was, it seemed, at a nuclear crossroad.
"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 said operation.
This was not only the US showing off its might, but also an internal ding-dong between the navy and the newly formed Air Force (the air force having previously been part of the army). First drop is an air drop, by the air force, on 1 July. A 20kt device similar to that used on Japan, it lands 600 yards off target, which is why most of the films and fotos of it are off centre! It was "not very impressive" to the thousands of people observing. It did sink a few small ships, but the bigguns survived to tell the tale. For the next 3 weeks people scrambled over them, LIVED in them and all built up nice doses of radiation, thank you very much indeed.
On 25 July the navy, having suspended a similar device 90ft below the surface of the sea, set off their little baby. Kaboom! A much more impressive display, it has to be said. This explosion not only looked amazing, it also dumped serious amounts of radiation on the ships and on Bikini. Those that are now at the bottom of the lagoon sank, some, like the Eugen got towed to Kwaj and sank and some were returned to the US and were broken up or sued for target practice.
25 July 1946 - "For the Good of Mankind" according to the US Government
The resulting data was used for scientific purposes to determine the future of nuclear weapons and Bikini was abandoned. (Remember, there were to be 3 tests! Just keeping you on your toes!)
Now, the people of Bikini assumed that they would be able to return to their island soon after the tests had finished, but obviously they had not been told about the radiation. They were subsequently banished from their island until it was safe to return. As you will know, they are yet to do so, and most are currently living on the island of Kili. I think it safer for me not to get into the politics of the whole things, so I will leave that to your own research!
Now, remember, there were to be 3 tests at Bikini .
Things were pretty quiet until 1948, when Truman authorised a series of tests because Cold War tensions were increasing and the only stockpiles of weapons that the US had were based on the design of the Trinity test, as used in Japan and at Bikini. These tests were to take place at Enewetak, also in the Marshalls. Subsequently, there were 7 more "Operations" at Enewetak and at the Nevada test site, including, in 1952, Operation Ivy, where the US started developing a hydrogen bomb - a thermonuclear device. The Mike test at Enewetak on I November 1952 was that test, and this paved the way for Operation Castle in 1954, to take place on Bikini.
Now, don't forget, there were to be 3 tests at Bikini .
Having built a hydrogen bomb at Enewetak that was about the size of a house, the US started trying to redesign the bomb to make it deliverable by air.
On 1 March 1954 the US tested their third bomb at Bikini - the Bravo. This was the first dry or solid fuel hydrogen bomb, filled with lithium deuteride, and was the largest bomb EVER set off by the US. In fact, it resulted in an explosion almost 3 times greater than expected, due to the tritium provided by the lithium-7 isotope which made up most of the lithium. Coming in at a whopping 15 megatons (that's 15 million tons of TNT equivalent, compared with only 20 thousand tons for the 1946 tests and those in Japan), the bomb vaporised 3 islands, blew a hole 250ft deep and 6500ft in diameter in the atoll. The resulting mushroom cloud rose 130,000ft into the air, and drifted across the atolls of Rongerik, Rongelap, Ailinginae and Utirik because the powers that be could not be bothered to wait for the prevailing winds to blow the radioactivity away from islands of inhabitation, but rather wanted to set the thing off on the day they had planned. This was to be the worst radiological disaster in US history. The entire atoll was contaminated, and the exclusion zone around the test was increased to 570,000 sq miles, a circle 850 miles in diameter.
01 March 1954 - the world's first solid fuel thermonuclear device goes off
The Americans had got their 3 tests in at Bikini and their thinking was, well the place is totally uninhabitable now, let's nuke it to buggery!
In the space of 2 and a half months from 1 March to 14 May 1954, the Americans dropped 48 megatons of bombs on Bikini. By 1958, when they finished, the total was nearer 75 megatons. Three cheers for the Americans!
The Bikinians then started asking questions such as:
Q: "What the hell have you done to our island?"
A: Err nuked it
Q: "When can we go back?"
A: Aah, ummm, well, not for a VERY long time, I am afraid.
Q: "Can we sue you?"
A: Oh, darn, shoot
So various trust funds were set up for the Bikinians, and they have been living off them every since. A few families returned to Bikini in the 70s but soon became ill, and since then they have never really trusted anything the Americans will say to them about whether it is or is not safe to return.
The main reason that they cant go back is because there is Caesium in the soil, and the coconut & pandanus palms and breadfruit trees, their main staple diet, take up caesium instead of potassium, and irradiate their fruit. The coconut crabs that also eat the coconuts, have taken the caesium into their bodies. Bikinians like eating coconut crabs. The ground water is also contaminated. So all their "land" food is unfit to eat.
Anyway, Bikini was "abandoned" for a few decades, and in the late 80s a feasibility study was done on the wrecks to see if the place could be turned into a sort of marine park where divers pay money to see them. The rest, as they say, is history.
Anyway, that's enough history for one day. There'll be test next week.
So, the diving. Well, firstly, people assume the diving in Bikini is deep and dangerous, and is some sort of tech diver's dream. Well, I'd like to blow that preconception out of the window immediately. The dives ARE deeper than you can do on Nitrox (except the check-out dive on the Saratoga), so you dive on air, and you decompress on a Nitrox mix that varies from 74-80%. The Nitrox is fed to a deco station suspended under the dive tender by way of whips - each diver has their own whip.
Decostation!
So, you do the dive on air and the deco on Nitrox. Simple! Most of the dives are in the 130-170ft range. You can dive on single 15l steels with single or twin valves or twin aluminium tanks (please not correct spelling of aluminium, Americans!) with isolation manifolds. That is more than enough air for you to do both the dive AND decompress if, for some reason the mooring line had bust and the tender had drifted off. If you have a computer that allows you to switch gas mixes underwater (Nitek Diverite3 or Suunto Vitek, for instance), then you can speed up your decompression. Otherwise you have to stay on air on the computer and hang for some time on the deco station. It does not cut back on the length of the dive itself, just makes it longer to get out of the water. Dives with switchable computers can expect to be off gassed in about half the time it takes for a diver on an air computer. Some computers just won't work there - cheap "sport diving" computers for instance. You do need something a little more heavy duty.
The island only takes 11 divers, so the group is split into 2, with a 15 minute interval between each group entering the water. There is a guide with each group, though not all the dives are "guided" as such. Tim Williams, the guy in charge, is a good photographer and knows what it is like to pose for divers - if you do not have a buddy and want someone to pose for you, he's your man!
All the wrecks are located no more than about 20 minutes from the resort.
Here's a map to orientate yourselves.
And here's a picture of the dive tender, if you're interested Its called Able Baker, after the two bombs in 1946.
Dive boat.
Anyway, as this posting has become quite long, I'll post the waffle about the dives on another posting, as this may become rather long winded!
