Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll
Part of: Society for Historical Archaeology 2020
This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll," at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.
In July 1946, the world’s first nuclear tests took place at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Two separate tests, code-named Able and Baker, deployed two plutonium core nominal yield 20 kiloton weapons against a fleet of 95 target ships. As a result of the tests, 21 vessels remain sunk in Bikini lagoon along with scattered test equipment, including aircraft and vehicles. In June 2019, the first comprehensive survey of the target fleet wrecks and all associated artifacts was conducted to gain a detailed sense through sonar mapping of the physical, archaeological legacy of these significant Cold War events. The survey revealed for the first time the crater from the July 25 test, an underwater blast, target ships, and artifacts including test aircraft. The survey also provided a detailed sonar survey of two more substantial hydrogen bomb tests that left two large overlapping craters on the edge of the atoll.
Other Keywords
Bikini atoll •
Nuclear bomb •
Photogrammetry •
Shipwrecks •
Naval •
Maritime Cultural Landscapes •
Crater •
Bathymetric Sonar •
Nuclear weapons
Temporal Keywords
World War II •
Cold War •
20th Century
Geographic Keywords
Coahuila (State / Territory) •
New Mexico (State / Territory) •
Oklahoma (State / Territory) •
Arizona (State / Territory) •
Texas (State / Territory) •
Sonora (State / Territory) •
United States of America (Country) •
Chihuahua (State / Territory) •
Nuevo Leon (State / Territory) •
Delaware (State / Territory)
Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-4 of 4)
- Documents (4)
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Atomic Craters and Bedforms in Bikini: Detailed Geomorphic Signatures of the Seabed (2020)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. From 1946 to 1958 a series of 22 atomic bombs were tested throughout Bikini atoll resulting in a series of anthropogenic craters around the atoll. Now 61 years later, questions remain about what evidence remains for these tests and how human...
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Craters, Coral Heads, and Capitol Ships: The Submarine Landscape of Bikini Atoll (2020)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. An expedition to Bikini Atoll conducted the first comprehensive sonar survey of the target area from Operation Crossroads that detonated two nuclear weapons against a moored fleet of warships. In addition to documenting the 12 shipwrecks sunk by...
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From Above and Below: Combining High-Resolution Bathymetry and Photogrammetry to Document Operation Crossroads in New Detail (2020)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. In 1946, Operations Crossroads subjected a fleet of warships moored in Bikini Atoll to aerial and subaqueous atomic blasts to determine the effect of atomic weapons in naval settings. A new expedition was conducted in June 2019 to examine effects...
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Operation Crossroads in Perspective (2020)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Mapping Crossroads: Archaeological and High Resolution Documentation of Nuclear Test Submerged Cultural Resources at Bikini Atoll" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The 1946 atomic tests at Bikini Atoll, known as Operation Crossroads, left a diverse archaeological record at Bikini, as well as off the West Coast of the continental US, Hawaii and Kwajalein Atoll. This paper reviews the historical context and...