page_title: Nuclear testing at Bikini Atoll
section_title: Residents relocated
hierarchical_section_title: Nuclear testing at Bikini Atoll / Preparation / Residents relocated
caption_attribution_description: English: Members of the Seabees' 53rd Naval Construction Battalion build camera towers prior to atomic bomb testing on Bikini Atoll, July 1946.
context_page_description: Nuclear testing at Bikini Atoll consisted of the detonation of 23 nuclear weapons by the United States between 1946 and 1958 on Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Tests occurred at seven test sites on the reef itself, on the sea, in the air, and underwater. The test weapons produced a combined fission yield of 42.2 Mt of explosive power.
  The United States was engaged in a Cold War nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union to build more advanced bombs from 1947 until 1991. The first series of tests over Bikini Atoll in July 1946 was code named Operation Crossroads. The first test was dropped from an aircraft and detonated 520 ft above the target fleet. The second was Baker and was suspended under a barge. It produced a large Wilson cloud and contaminated all of the target ships. Chemist Glenn T. Seaborg was the longest-serving chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and he called the second test "the world's first nuclear disaster."
  The second series of tests in 1954 was code named Operation Castle. The first detonation was Castle Bravo, which tested a new design utilizing a dry fuel thermonuclear bomb. It was detonated at dawn on March 1, 1954.
context_section_description: In February 1946, the United States government asked the 167 Micronesian inhabitants of the atoll to temporarily relocate so that testing could begin on atomic bombs. King Juda agreed to the request, announcing that "we will go believing that everything is in the hands of God." Nine of the eleven family heads chose Rongerik as their new home. Navy Seabees helped them to disassemble their church and community house and prepare to relocate to their new home. On March 7, 1946, the residents gathered their belongings and building supplies. They were transported 125 mi (201 km) eastward on Navy landing craft 1108 and LST 861 to the uninhabited Rongerik Atoll, which was one-sixth the size of Bikini Atoll. No one lived on Rongerik because it had an inadequate water and food supply, and also due to traditional beliefs that the island was haunted by the Demon Girls of Ujae. The Navy left them with a few weeks of food and water which soon proved inadequate.
caption: Members of the Seabees' 53rd Naval Construction Battalion build camera towers prior to atomic bomb testing on Bikini Atoll, July 1946.
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