In 1946 the US found a remote and sparsely inhabited island in the Marshall
group, throwing off 167 natives "for the good of mankind" and arranged to
test three nuclear bombs on various obsolete and captured WW2 ships to see
what they would do to them. The operation was known as Operation Crossroads,
because mankind was, it seemed, at a nuclear crossroad.
Two of those ships were the German battlecruiser Prinz Eugen and the
Japanese battleship Nagato. The Prinz Eugen survived the blasts, but sank
whilst being towed to Kwajalein. The Nagato sank several days later, and
lies upside down on the lagoon floor. Complete text and pics at:
<http://www.scuba-safaris.com/pages/destination/bikini/bikini_wrecks.html>
In 1989, I was a member of a US Navy dive team tasked to locate and mark the
ships. We found 9 of the 13. Pretty amazing to see a full-size warship
underwater.
Tidbit: The name of the research vessel we were on was EGABRAG, which is
"garbage" spelled backwards. Bet that would make an interesting personalized
plate. <g>
` ___ '
Pete - (O o) -
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Lake Forest Park, WA
1966 1600 (SPL311-00799)
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