Caroline Island
From Open Encyclopedia
- Not to be confused with the Caroline Islands in the western Pacific.
Image:NASA-CarolineAtoll.JPG Caroline Island or Caroline Atoll (also known as "Millennium Island"), is an uninhabited coral atoll in the central Pacific Ocean located at 10°00′S 150°25′W. It is considered to be one of the southern Line Islands and is part of the territory of the Republic of Kiribati. Caroline Atoll achieved recent noteriety as the first point of land on earth to have entered the year 2000 based upon official local time, due to a 1995 realignment of the International Date Line (see below) that put it as the easternmost island in the Republic of Kiribati, which is west of the Date Line (each day officially starts at the date line).
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Geography
This slightly crescent-shaped atoll (3.76 square km in area) consists of a reef surrounding a narrow lagoon that is roughly 6 km by 0.5 km; the reef supports some 38 separate islets. Caroline extends approximately 9.2 km from north to south, and is about 1.6 km wide. At their highest points, the islets rise only 6 meters above sea level.
Like all atolls, the islets are sand deposits and limestione rock set upon a coral reef that in places extends approximately a mile out from the shore. On Caroline, there are no natural anchoranges or deep water openings into the mosly shallow lagoon. Landings are generally made at a small break in the reef at the northwest corner of South Islet. A freshwater aquifer (or Ghyben-Herzberg lens) exists below the largest islets at the northern and southern ends, and wells tap drinking water for temporary settlements (two on South Islet, one on Nake Islet).
Named islets on the atoll include Nake Islet and Long Islet at the northern end, Pig Islet, Brothers Islet, and Arundel Islet along the eastern side of the lagoon. Bird Islet west of the lagoon, and South Islet at the southern end of the atoll.
Flora and fauna
Caroline Island is considered to be the most unspoiled of the Line Islands, and was at one time under consideration for designation as a World Heritage Site. Caroline Island is an important breeding site for a number of species of seabirds, most notably the Sooty Tern (a colony dominates the eastern islets) and the Great Frigatebird. Caroline Island is home to one of world's largest populations of Coconut crab (Birgus latro). Other notable animals include Tridacna clams and Green Sea Turtles. Groves of Pisonia trees grow on most of the islets.
History
The first recorded sighting of Caroline Atoll occurred on December 16, 1795 by Captain William Robert Broughton of the HMS Providence. Caroline was again sighted in 1821 by the English whaling ship Supply and was then named "Thornton Island" for the ship's captain. There is, however, some evidence of prior settlement by Polynesian peoples on both South and northernmost Nake islets.
In 1872, the island was leased by the British government to Houlder Brothers, who conducted minimal guano mining on the island. In 1883, an expedition of American astronomers traveled from Peru to Caroline Island aboard the USS Hartford to observe the 1883 total solar eclipse on May 6. A French expedition also observed the eclipse from Caroline, and the United States Navy mapped the atoll.
In 1846, a small stock-raising and copra (coconut meat) community was established on the island. In 1868, Caroline was claimed by the British vessel HMS Reindeer, which noted 27 residents in a settlement on South Islet. The island's settlement slowly decreased in population and by 1926 was down to only 10 residents; in 1936, the settlement consisted of only two Tahitian families before abandonment sometime in the late 1930s. The island has been uninhabited since then.
The entire island is presently owned by the government of the Republic of Kiribati. It is occasionally visited by copra gatherers. Caroline was also leased to a French Polynesian entrepreneur in the 1990s; he established a small homestead on one of the islets and reportedly had plans for development of the atoll.
At various times, the atoll has also been known under the names of Hirst Island, Clark Island, and Independence Island.
Time zone realignment
On December 23, 1994, the Republic of Kiribati announced a change of time zone for the Line Islands, to take effect January 1, 1995. This adjustment effectively moved the International Date Line over 1000 kilometers to the east within Kiribati, placing all of Kiribati on the Asian or western side of the date line, despite the fact that Caroline Atoll's longitude of 150 degrees west corresponds to UTC−10 rather than its official time zone of UTC+14. Caroline Atoll now is at the same time as the Hawaiian Islands (Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time Zone), but one day later.
In 1999, in order to capitalize upon the massive public interest in celebrations marking the arrival of the year 2000, Caroline Island was officially renamed Millennium Island. Although the island was uninhabited, a special celebration was held on the island, performed by native entertainers from Kiribati, attended by Kiribati president Teburoro Tito and broadcast by satellite worldwide.fr:île du Millénaire
