Kiribati Islands High Resolution Bathymetry Survey Report (ER114)

This record holds the Technical report describing a SOPAC Division marine survey carried out for Kiribati, on the islands of Abaiang, Tarawa, Abemama, Banaba and Onotoa.
This report describes the high-resolution bathymetric mapping survey of the seabed surrounding the islands of Abaiang, Tarawa, Abemama, Banaba and Onotoa in Kiribati.
The work was initiated by the Pacific Islands Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) and the European Union (EU) Reducing Vulnerability of Pacific ACP States
Project.The survey described in the report was conducted to investigate the seabed and provide information about water depths around the islands using a multibeam echosounder (MBES).Coastline: Predominantly small, lowlying and relatively flat, Kiribati can be considered as entirely coastal.The Republic of Kiribati comprises 33 atolls, of which only 20 are inhabited, in 3 principal island groups, scattered within an area of about 5 million square kilometers (2 million square miles) in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The three island groups are the Gilbert Islands, the Line Islands, and the Phoenix Islands.The country extends about 3870 kilometres from east to west and about 2050 kilometres from north to south and has a coastline of 1143 kilometers .The total land area is 811 square kilometres. The nearest neighbors are Nauru to the west, and Tuvalu and Tokelau to the south. The capital, Tarawa, is on the island of Bairiki, the most populous island witharound 65 000 inhabitants. The nation's largest atoll is Kiritimati (Christmas Island) in the Line Islands group at the eastern extremity—at 388 square kilometres. The smallest is Banaba Island in the west at 6 square kilometers.