McKean Island

Template: Infobox Island / Maintenance / height missing

McKean, old names: Dummond 's Iceland, Iceland Arthur, is a small, uninhabited coral island, isolated in the west of the Phoenix Islands and is politically part of the island republic of Kiribati.

Geography

The island McKean is about 400 kilometers south of the equator in the central Pacific Ocean. She is a nearly circular, Upscale atoll with less than a kilometer in diameter, just a few meters rises above the sea surface. The land area is 0.57 km ² and is surrounded by a dense fringing reef, which falls partly dry at low water levels. When filled with mud, sand, brackish water and bird droppings depression in the interior of the island is no longer tell whether it is the remainder of the original lagoon or a consequence of the guano mining. A further deepening, a kind of shallow trench of about 150 m in length and a few meters in width on the north coast, parallel to the beach, could perhaps have been excavated or extended by human hands.

Flora and Fauna

Due to the extensive guano mining in the second half of the 19th century, the island surface has been completely changed. Today's barren flora consists mainly of secondary vegetation, which suffers from the fact that rain falls only sparse and irregular. Another problem for plant growth is the wind- distributed over the flat island of salty spray. There exist only a few low -growing or creeping types, including for the mallow family owned, dwarf growing shrub Sida fallax, the Meerportulak ( Sesuvium portulacastrum ), Tribulus cistoides and the grasses lepturus lepens and Fimbristylis cymosa.

Since 1938, the island is a protected area with limited access due to its importance as a breeding area for seabirds. In McKean nesting site for birds in significant populations, including Red-tailed Tropicbird ( Phaethon rubricauda ), Masked Booby (Sula dactylatra ), White-bellied Booby (Sula leucogaster ), Red-footed Booby (Sula sula ), Sooty Tern (Sterna fuscata ), frigate birds and some petrel species.

A plague for the ground-nesting seabirds were Asian house rat (Rattus tanezumi ). They probably came from a crashed 2003 Korean ship whose wreck is still on the reef. Mid-2008 was carried out an expedition which had the aim of restoring biodiversity. The rats were eradicated.

History

It is not known whether the island was inhabited in pre-European times. The few written documents of European explorers give gives no guidance. A permanent settlement seems unlikely, as the island is very small, the natural resources are limited and do not occur freshwater sources.

In 1985, the 2nd Field Survey Squadron directed the Australian Army several stations one of the Phoenix Islands. In a reconnaissance flight to the rarely visited McKean Island on August 10, 1985 we discovered several previously unknown stone structures on the west coast. The age and function of the relics are still unknown. The most striking structure is about 50 meters from the beach and consists of still 2.10 m high walls. It is placed from raw slabs of limestone without mortar and sees the foundations of a 12.5 x 16 m large, rectangular house similar. In the northeast of the ruins there is a low and narrow entrance. However, the southwest side is completely missing, maybe it was never built. With several other, smaller and lower building remains also lacks the ( downwind ) southwest side.

Another approximately 50 x 20 m by measuring complex of today less than a meter high walls consisting is even more puzzling. It consists of eleven contiguous rooms of irregular shape of which only one has access.

Two lines shown with boulders lead a v-shape to the beach and disappear into the sea. Their function is unknown, it may be the remains of a fish trap. It is obvious that the buildings from the time of the phosphate exploitation come, but it is not excluded that they are evidence of pre-European settlement.

The island McKean was on 28 May 1794 by the British retail Captain Henry Barber [note 1] for Europe discovers who was with his Schnau Arthur on the journey from Australia to China. He called the low, apparently uninhabited island " Dummond 's Iceland ." The discovery was reported in the Arrowsmith map of 1798 as " Arthur Iceland ", after the name of Barber Ship.

From about 1820, the waters were to the Phoenix Islands are a favorite hunting ground of the whalers, mainly from Nantucket. It is therefore to assume that McKean has been sighted or visited at this time of several whaling ships.

The USS Vincennes of the United States Exploring Expedition under the command of Charles Wilkes explored the island on August 19, 1840. Wilkes let them measure and map and took a brief description in his report on. He called them " McKean 's Iceland " which they saw first the crew member.

" She rises about 26 feet [about 8 m] above the sea surface and bears no vegetation except a scanty growth of coarse grass. "

Relying on the Guano Islands Act of 1856 raised the U.S. claims of ownership. The exploitation of guano deposits - a valuable fertilizer and raw material for the manufacture of explosives - took over the Phoenix Guano Company, one of the many start-ups in the United States as a result of the Guano Islands Act. The activities started in 1858 with the posting of the schooner EL Frost under the command of Captain Thomas Long to explore more of the Phoenix Islands, including McKean. The guano mining began in the summer of 1859 with 29 workers of Hawaii. For the removal of the yield was erected on the island a pier and wooden rails on which drawn by mules and horses and carts wrong. The first cargo of guano McKean with 1,200 tons reached the U.S. East Coast in January 1860 and confirmed the fertility of the estimated more than 100,000 tons of guano reserves. But the reduction in 1870 was abandoned.

1936 was the belonging to the British Pacific Squadron sloop HMS Leith (U 36 ) to the island McKean and took it, like the rest of the Phoenix Islands, the United Kingdom in possession. The Union Jack was hoisted and leave a deed in a sealed canister. McKean then became part of British colony of Gilbert and Ellice Islands and since 1979 the independent Pacific island nation of Kiribati.

As a time was long suspected the missing pilot Amelia Earhart in the Pacific could have crashed during an emergency landing at on McKean. However, the hypothesis proved to be pure speculation. Evidence there is not today.

McKean's coast with Fairy Tern in flight

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