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Butaritari Atoll

Butaritari Atoll and part of Makin (upper right). Most of Makin is missing from this map and only a portion is visible.

Butaritari (previously known as Makin, Pitt Island, Taritari Island, or Touching Island) is an atoll located in the Pacific Ocean island nation of Kiribati.

Three kilometers to the northeast is Makin. Butaritari was called Makin Atoll by the U.S. military, and Makin was then known as Makin Meang or Little Makin to distinguish it. Now that Butaritari has become the preferred name for the larger atoll, speakers tend to drop the qualifier for Makin.

Butaritari atoll has a land area of 13.6 km² and a population of 4,200 as of 2002.

The atoll is roughly four-sided and nearly 30 km across in the east west direction, and averages about 15 km north to south. The reef is more submerged and broken into several broad channels along the west side. Small islets are found on reef sections between these channels. The atoll reef is continuous but almost without islets along the north side. In the northeast corner, the reef is some 1.75 km across and with only scattered small islet development. Thus, the lagoon of Butaritari is very open to exchange with the ocean. The lagoon is deep and can accommodate large ships, though the entrance passages are relatively narrow.

The south and southeast portion of the atoll comprises a nearly continuous islet, broken only by a single, broad section of interislet reef. These islets are mostly between 0.2 and 0.5 km across, but widen in the areas where the reef changes directions. Mangrove swamps appear well developed in these latter areas as well as all along the southern lagoon shore. Narrow islets are somewhat characteristic of Kiribati atolls running east-west.

Bikati and Bikatieta islets occupy a corner of the reef at the extreme northwest tip of the atoll, bordering what may be a second small lagoon to the north of the main lagoon. Larger Bikati (2 by 0.5 km) harbors a village. The main village is Butaritari, population approximately 2,000.

Butaritari, Keuea, Kuma, Tanimaiaki, Tekabetete

It is one of the lushest of the "outer islands" due to good rainfall. Typical annual rainfall is about 4 m, compared with about 2 m on Tarawa Atoll and 1 m in the far south of Kiribati. Rainfall on Butaritari is enhanced during an El Niño.

Butaritari was a place of residence for Robert Louis Stevenson in his quest for a new life and the subject of a subsequent story. In his book In The South Seas he devotes the majority of the second half to his observations and history of Butaritari and Makin. See [1] for a free online copy.

Supposedly, there is a Guano Islands Act claim of the United States to Butaritari and Little Makin^{[citation needed]}.

Commercial and trading capital of the Gilbert Islands until Burns Philp moved south and set themselves up in Tarawa Atoll—they followed the seat of political power south. The earliest trading companies were the Hamburg-based DPHG with Pacific headquarters in Samoa and On Chong (Chinese traders with Australian connections via the goldfields).

Establishment of the Japanese trading company (Nanyo Boeki Kabushiki Kaisha) in Butaritari Village. Gradual decline of On Chong through the 1920s with low copra prices. Takeover of On Chong by WR Carpenter based in Rabaul.

Butaritari atoll was the site of the Makin Raid in August 1942, when the U.S. Marine Raiders landed from the submarine Nautilus II, as a feint to draw Japanese attention away from the planned invasion route through the Solomons. In November 1943, elements of the 27th Infantry Division took the island, in the Battle of Makin.

The runway on Butaritari has been extended to the full length of the old WW2 American strip (about 5,000 feet?) and a service with a route of Tarawa Atoll–Butaritari–Majuro operated for a short period in 1995. The aim was to facilitate the development of a strong cash crop economy on the island and link the Marshall Islands with Kiribati. It was soon seen to be an inviable dream.^{[citation needed]}

See USS Makin Island for ships of the U.S. Navy named for the island.

Coordinates: 3°10′04″N, 172°49′33″E