Atiu
| Atiu | ||
|---|---|---|
 |
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| Waters | Pacific Ocean | |
| Archipelago | Cook Islands | |
| Geographical location | 19 ° 59 ′ 0 ″ S , 158 ° 7 ′ 0 ″ W | |
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| length | 7.2 km | |
| width | 4.8 km | |
| surface | 26.9 km² | |
| Highest elevation | 70 m | |
| Residents | 570 (2006) 21 inhabitants / km² |
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| main place | Mapumai | |
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Atiu (also called Enuamanu ) is a 27 km² island belonging to the Polynesian Cook Islands . It belongs to the southern archipelago of the Cook Islands and is 187 km northeast of the main island of Rarotonga . Almost 570 inhabitants (2006 census) live in five villages on Atiu. The population is falling rapidly due to emigration to New Zealand and Australia; at the 2001 census, Atiu still had a population of 623.
Atiu is about 11 million years old and of volcanic origin. In contrast to most other volcanic islands in the South Pacific, it still rises about 0.2 mm per year from the sea floor. It emerged from a hot spot in the earth's crust , from which an undersea volcano emerged, which, however, extinguished before it could reach the sea surface. As a result of the slow tectonic movement of the sea floor, it was lifted over a period of 8 million years together with the extinct volcano (today's Atiu), so that the coral reef below the surface finally emerged from the water. The island consists almost entirely of coral rock with only a few pockets of fertile soil on which agriculture is possible.
See also
Web links
- Extensive information about the island
- Aileen Tiedemann: South Seas vacation on Atiu ; Spiegel Online, March 11, 2013
Individual evidence
- ^ Total Population and Land Area by Iceland . (PDF 9 kB) Government Cook Islands , 2006, archived from the original on July 22, 2007 ; accessed on June 22, 2018 (English, original website no longer available).
