Bikini Atoll

Bikini Atoll

10 AND 11 NIGHT TRIPS

  

As most wrecks at Bikini Atoll are beyond recreational depth limits, this itinerary is recommended only for technical divers with previous wreck experience.

   

Bikini, Republic of the Marshall Islands Itinerary

   

The following is a sample itinerary of dive sites and wrecks we may visit during your liveaboard safari with Master Liveaboards in Bikini Atoll. The trip aims to show you the very best diving possible, but a number of factors can determine where divers can visit. Weather, tides, currents and other factors play a part in the Cruise Director’s decision of which route the yacht takes. Whilst every attempt to ensure that the number of dives scheduled is fulfilled, bad weather can hinder the yacht’s ability to reach a specified dive site in good time. The safety of all on board is paramount and the dive team will always do their best to offering diving at alternate locations should guests be unable to visit those sites listed below.

    

Your Cruise Director will schedule a minimum of 2 dives per day. The diving day has a typical schedule as follows:

  • Breakfast followed by a briefing & Dive 1
  • Lunch, relaxation followed by briefing & Dive 2
  • Snack, relaxation
  • Dinner

    

Diving Bikini – The Marshall Islands

   

Bikini Atoll is part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, which covers nearly 1 million square miles of idyllic emerald-green coral atolls, surrounded by the crystal-blue waters of the Pacific. A one of a kind diving paradise, as it features not only beautiful reefs, corals and wonderful marine life. Above all, it is the final resting place for some of the most significant warships in history. Bikini Lagoon is the first UNESCO World Heritage site for the Marshall archipelago and is undisputedly ranked first on any serious wreck divers’ bucket-list. This is well justified; as nowhere else on earth you will be able to dive such a unique collection of historic battleships, cruisers, as well as the world famous USS Saratoga aircraft carrier with its 270 metre flight deck.

   

Explosive history

   

In 1946, following the end of World War II, the United States gathered together a “mock” naval fleet in order to test the effects of atomic bomb blasts on a large naval fleet. They named it Operation Crossroads and designated Bikini Atoll to be one of the sites for the explosive tests, with the local inhabitants displaced to another atoll. More Operations followed suit; from land, on the reef, on the sea, from the air and underwater. Between 1946 and 1958, the United States tested a grand total of 67 nuclear weapons on the Marshall Islands, of which ‘Castle Bravo’ on Bikini Lagoon in 1954 is the best-known. This 15-megaton TNT hydrogen atomic bomb was a thousand times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. It left a crater in the lagoon of 2 kilometres wide and 76 metres deep. Bikini Atoll was opened for diving in 1996, allowing divers to experience some of the most historic and unparalleled wreck diving in the world.

    

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