Beaches in Marshall Islands

Twenty-nine atolls and five islands in the central Pacific, averaging two metres above sea level. The United States conducted sixty-seven nuclear tests here between 1946 and 1958, including Castle Bravo at Bikini, and the consequences — displacement, contamination and the concrete dome at Runit holding the waste — are the country's defining modern history. Bikini and Enewetak lagoons are a UNESCO World Heritage site inscribed for exactly that. The diving on the sunken test fleet is among the most extraordinary anywhere and the ethics of it are contested. Practically: Majuro is the entry point and inter-atoll travel is by irregular flight or ship. Bikini and Enewetak require permission and there is no scheduled transport. Radiological questions differ between land and sea and current guidance should be read rather than assumed. The country's beaches are recorded here because their history is inseparable from them, not despite it. Majuro atoll holds around half the population on a strip of land rarely more than a few hundred metres wide.