Муруроа атолдары: Тарих және ядролық сынақтар орны

Atoll in French Polynesia

Moruroa (Mururoa, Mururura), also historically known as Aopuni, is an atoll which forms part of the Tuamotu Archipelago in French Polynesia in the southern Pacific Ocean. It is located about southeast of Tahiti. Administratively Moruroa Atoll is part of the commune of Tureia, which includes the atolls of Tureia, Fangataufa, Tematangi and Vanavana. France undertook nuclear weapon tests between 1966 and 1996 at Moruroa and Fangataufa, causing international protests, notably in 1974 and 1995. The number of tests performed on Moruroa has been variously reported as 175 and 181.

The first recorded visit this atoll was Commander Philip Carteret on HMS Swallow in 1767, just a few days after he had discovered Pitcairn Island. Carteret named Mururoa "Bishop of Osnaburgh Island". In 1792, the British whaler Matilda was wrecked here, and it became known as Matilda's Rocks. A visiting ship in 1834 killed all but three of the inhabitants it found there, and it was unclaimed in 1847. The atoll was officially established as a nuclear test site by France on 21 September 1962, when the Direction des Centres d'Expérimentations Nucléaires (DIRCEN) was established to administer the nuclear testing. This followed with the construction of various infrastructures on the atoll commencing in May 1963. The atoll of Hao, to the north west of Mururoa, was chosen as a support base for the nuclear tests and other operations. Despite objections from some 30 members of the Polynesian Territorial Assembly, the first nuclear test was conducted on 2 July 1966, code named Aldebaran, when a plutonium fission bomb was exploded in the lagoon. President Charles de Gaulle himself was present at Moruroa on 10 September 1966 when a test was conducted, using a device suspended from a balloon. Smaller blasts were detonated on the northern end of the atoll, designated as Denise. France abandoned atmospheric nuclear testing in 1974 and moved to underground testing in the midst of intense world pressure which was sparked by the New Zealand Government of the time, which sent two frigates in July 1973, HMNZS Canterbury and Otago, to the atoll in protest for a nuclear free Pacific. Shafts were drilled deep into the volcanic rocks underlying the atolls where nuclear devices were detonated. This practice created much controversy as cracking of the atolls was discovered, resulting in fears that the radioactive material trapped under the atolls would eventually escape and contaminate the surrounding ocean and neighbouring atolls, a case of so called tired mountain syndrome. A major accident occurred on 25 July 1979 when a test was conducted at half the usual depth because the nuclear device got stuck halfway down the 800 metre shaft. The atoll is still guarded by French Forces.

A report from 2012 suggested that only 11 of the 20 monitoring system sensors are actually functional, which could mean the atoll could potentially collapse without forewarning of the monitoring system. In February 2021, the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research INSERM published a report entitled "Nuclear tests and health Consequences in French Polynesia".