No Promised Land: The Shared Legacy of the Castle Bravo Nuclear Test

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the Castle Bravo nuclear detonation in the Marshall Islands. The US military conducted 67 nuclear tests in the Pacific Proving Grounds from 1946 to 1958. The Castle Bravo test, conducted on Mar 1, 1954, at Bikini Atoll, was 1,000 times the force of the Hiroshima bomb. The explosion sent irradiated coral dust throughout the atolls. Neighboring atoll populations, who were neither informed of the tests nor relocated prior to the detonation, today continue to experience health issues, cultural upheaval, and physical dislocation due to the environmental degradation produced by the test and the effects of climate change. The Bravo detonation remains the largest nuclear test ever conducted by the US. Although the US tested an additional 55 nuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands, Castle Bravo is the most notorious due to its impact, primarily on the people of the Marshall Islands.