Christmas Island British Army

Map of kiritimati island kiribati credit.

Christmas island british army. We are the largest and fastest growing community of uk forces veterans on the web with over 500 000 members. The british supposedly conducted their first successful hydrogen bomb test at malden island on may 15 1957. Members who served with raf christmas island. The majority of the.

The tests ended six years later and parts of the island were sealed off. Operation grapple was a set of four british nuclear weapons test series of early atomic bombs and hydrogen bombs carried out in 1957 and 1958 at malden island and kiritimati christmas island in the gilbert and ellice islands in the pacific ocean modern kiribati as part of the british hydrogen bomb programme nine nuclear explosions were initiated culminating in the united kingdom becoming. The battle of christmas island was a small engagement which began on 31 march 1942 during world war ii assisted by a mutiny by soldiers of the british indian army against their british officers imperial japanese army troops were able to occupy christmas island without any land based resistance. 1940 world war 2 a close call read how christmas island was nearly bombarded by the infamous german auxilliary cruiser atlantis a commerce.

Kiritimati was the operation s main base. Several members of the armed forces were stationed at christmas island in the 1950s during atom bomb and hyrogen bomb tests. The campaign to get compensation failed and although i had nothing to do with the compensation claim i do feel all forces attending christmas island. Welcome to forces reunited the place where you can find information and friends from raf christmas island.

These were subjeccted to unnown risks and may have resulted in cancer. In 1957 the british military began conducting nuclear tests in the pacific ocean and based themselves on christmas island. Historic newspaper articles and stories. Christmas island tropical island 2016 pop.

1939 1945 a teacup in a storm christmas island in ww2 here is a wonderfully riveting article by ian foster about a very dark and frightening time in christmas island s history. The united states navy submarine seawolf caused severe damage to the imperial japanese navy. The british nuclear weapon tests on kiritimati or christmas island had profound and lasting cultural consequences for both atomic veterans and local islanders. Whilst the grapple series were a bombastic display of british military prowess there is a paradoxically human element to nuclear weapons testing.