Bikini kills
Soon after World War 2, nuclear tests made a tiny atoll in the Pacific unliveable. Its namesake swimsuit was also an explosion, but nobody got hurt (only some people's feelings).
Picture, if you will, a tropical paradise in the Pacific, a thin coral reef encircling a large lagoon. It’s sparsely populated and people live in peace. Now picture again: the paradise turns into hell — and will endure it 22 more times, for 12 years. Welcome (well, not really) to the Bikini atoll.
Hurry up for destruction
The United States didn’t waste any time after World War 2 and the genocide in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to start testing new nuclear weapons. In the vast Pacific Ocean, mostly water with small specks of land, the choice fell to a tiny atoll in the Marshall Islands, occupied by the United Sates during World War 2.
The name “Bikini” would become famous as a nuclear testing ground — with all the horrors that this entailed —, but also, on a (much) lighter note, as a swimsuit. Actually it’s safe to assume that most people don’t even know from where the beachwear got its name. So let me inject some unsettling thoughts in your mind. But it’s OK, just a little pinprick.
Power, corruption, and lies
The picture above gives an idea of the paradisiac place. It’s misleading though: the water and soil (and whatever still lives there) are poisoned. Only divers take their chances to explore the wreckage left by the ships destroyed during the tests — one of whose purposes was to verify how many could resist a nuclear blast and its consequences.
Little more than 160 people lived in Bikini in 1946, when the atoll was evacuated by the US government. The residents were told by the military governor of the Marshall Islands that they had to leave “for the good of mankind and to end all world wars”, and could be back soon.
These were the first in a litany of lies and deception that turned the Bikinians into exiles in other islands, whereto they were forcibly relocated. The documentary Bombs on Bikini tells their tragic story.
Tsunami of radiation
The first tests, starting on July 1 1946, used bombs similar to the ones dropped on Nagasaki. Ships and an assortment of animals were targeted to measure the impact of the blast and the spread of radiation. And it didn’t take long for a disaster to happen, in the second test, code-named “Baker”.
Baker was the first test taking place under water, and not surprisingly things went really bad. An extremely hot gas bubble reached the sea floor and surface at the same time, generating a geyser-like spray dome with about two million tons of water, 1,800 meters high. A tsunami followed, with waves of almost 30 meters, spreading radioactivity throughout all the vessels and animals. Many servicemen tasked with cleaning up the ships were also contaminated.
The catastrophe
But nothing compares to the “Castle Bravo” test on March 1 1954, with the first deliverable thermonuclear bomb (or hydrogen bomb). The test was catastrophic: scientists underestimated the destructive power of the device by a factor of 3.
The explosion had a yield of 15 megatons — the energy equivalent to 15 million tons of TNT —, or more than a thousand times the energy released by the bomb in Hiroshima. It was the most powerful bomb ever launched by the United States (there are not any bombs with yields like this anymore, thanks to the arms control treaties since the late 80s).
Ocean rain
Radioactive fallout spread over 18,000 square kilometres, reaching 15 islands and islets, with the predictable cases of cancer and birth defects among the civilian population. It was spread even further by the ocean currents. Once again, ships and servicemen were also affected.
Not far from the test was the hapless Japanese fishing vessel Daigo Fukuryu Maru, or Lucky Dragon Nº 5. The crew, unaware of what was going on, was exposed to fallout. All 23 fishermen suffered radiation sickness, resulting in the death of the radio operator. The tragedy was one of the inspirations for the first Godzilla.
The video below was shot from a distance of more than 90 km. The fireball expanded to 11 km wide. Monstrous.
No power to the people
The last nuclear test in Bikini happened in 1958. By then, the people from the island had been living for ten years in a barren, even smaller atoll called Kili (after being “temporarily” relocated to another one).
Understandably, Bikini islanders never felt at home in Kili after they moved there. Besides the almost complete lack of resources, their cultural heritage was basically erased. In 1970, 160 people were allowed to return to the island, with assurances that it was safe. Can you guess what happened?
Will get fooled again
This one is easy: It wasn’t safe at all. Bikini was evacuated in 1978, when scientists discovered that the islanders’ bodies had alarming levels of Cesium-137, together with plutonium and strontium-90. Cancers, abortions, and deformities took the usual, terrible toll. The victims were relocated to another island, and many believe they were used as guinea-pigs. Hard to disagree.
Today more than 5,000 Bikinians, among survivors and descendants, are scattered across the Marshall Islands, as well as the United States and other countries.
Even though they don’t live there, the Bikinians can at least earn income from tourism in the island (besides compensations, still the subject of ongoing legal battles). Bikini is perfect for “wreck diving”. Since the mid-90s, divers can explore the wreckage of the ships that sank (or where sunk) throughout the test period. The aircraft carrier USS Saratoga is their favourite destination.
In 2010, the Bikini atoll was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. According to the institution,
“Through its history, the atoll symbolises the dawn of the nuclear age, despite its paradoxical image of peace and of earthly paradise.”
A symbol that the islanders would rather go without.
From bomb to bombshell
The first Bikini test was a global news event. So much so that, only four days after the blast, the French fashion designer Louis Réard unveiled a daring swimsuit with the same name as the atoll: “like the bomb, the bikini is small and devastating”.
It was a shrewd marketing ploy, especially because Réard’s creation was not the first revealing two-piece swimsuit — not even the first alluding to the nuclear age. The honour went to the atome, created shortly before by another Frenchman, Jacques Heim. But come to think of it, “bikini” was much more catchy and, as it happens, timely. And it showed the bellybutton. L’atome, c’est fini.
The first bikini model was the nude dancer Micheline Bernardini (no “respectable” model accepted to try it). It was actually smaller than the designs that followed. Réard had an eye for shock.
Holidays in the Sun
And a shock it was. The new swimwear caused a scandal — it was banned in many places, and dismissed as a “French thing”. You know, those salacious Gallic. And in fact the bikini was first popularized worldwide by a rising French star called Brigitte Bardot (rings a bell?), who wore it in 1953, during the Cannes Film Festival.
While more and more European women adopted the new fashion, America still resisted. It was only in 1962 that an explosion was seen (rather than heard) around the world: Ursula Andress rising from the sea in her first scene in Dr No, which also happened to be the first James Bond film. It’s the most famous bikini of all time.
Two years later, Sports Illustrated first Swimsuit Issue helped establish the bikini as an indispensable fashion item.
It has been a twisted ride, from nuclear horror to fun at the beach. The Bikini islanders went from the latter to the former. Let’s hope we don’t go the same way.
Radio Bikini (1988) is an Oscar-nominated documentary by PBS about the first two nuclear tests in the atoll (called Operation Crossroads)
A comprehensive website about Bikini atoll and the nuclear tests is maintained by the Atomic Veterans
A short video telling the history of the bikini
The bikini between fashion and politics
