Marshall Islands

The Marshall Islands are 29 coral atolls and 5 low-lying islands scattered like a broken pearl necklace across 1.9 million square kilometers of the central Pacific. On a map they are nearly invisible - tiny rings of sand and palm surrounding turquoise lagoons in an ocean so vast it defies comprehension. But the Marshallese people navigated these waters for thousands of years using stick charts, reading wave patterns and currents with a precision that modern science is only beginning to understand.

The islands carry a heavy modern history. Between 1946 and 1958, the United States detonated 67 nuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands, including the Castle Bravo test at Bikini Atoll - the most powerful nuclear device the US ever exploded. The fallout contaminated entire atolls and displaced communities that have never been able to return home. Today, the Marshall Islands face another existential threat: rising sea levels. Most of the country sits barely a meter above the ocean, and the Marshallese have become some of the most eloquent voices in the global fight against climate change.