- Faaite
Faaite, or Faaiti is an atoll of the
Tuamotus inFrench Polynesia . It is located 60 km to the north ofAnaa Atoll. The total surface of the atoll is of 230 km². Its dry land area has a surface of 9 km². Its length is 28 Km and its width 10.5 Km.Faaite's inner lagoon has a navigable channel to the ocean. The main village is Hitianau, with a total population of 246.
History
The first recorded European to arrive to Faaite Atoll was
John Turnbull in1802 . Turnbull was the first retailer of the Pacific who used the route of Tahiti toHawaii .Russian oceanic explorer
Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen visited Faaite in 1820 on ships "Vostok" and "Mirni". He named this atoll "Miloradovich".This atoll reached a measure of fame after the "Bûchers de Faaite" affair. On September 2 1987 six persons were thrown into the fire (some of them by their own children) because the islanders were convinced that they were possessed by the devil.
There is a territorial (domestic) airfield in Faaite which was inaugurated in 1992.
Administration
Administratively Faaite belongs to the commune of Anaa, which includes the inhabited atoll of Faaite and the uninhabited atolls of
Tahanea andMotutunga .References
* [http://www.oceandots.com/pacific/tuamotu/faaite.htm]
* [http://www.world-airport-codes.com/french-polynesia/faaite-8177.html Faaite Airport]
*Bruno Saura, "Les bûchers de Faaite: paganisme ancestral ou dérapage chrétien en Polynésie française", Cobalt/Editions de l'après midi. Paris 1990
* [http://www.shvoong.com/humanities/1633870-faaite/ Book review]
* [http://www.jps.auckland.ac.nz/document/Volume_8_1899/Volume_8,_No._4,_December_1899/Names_of_the_Paumotu_Islands,_by_J.L._Young,_p_264-268?action=null Island names]External links
* [http://www.pacific-image.pf/pages/boutic/dboutic_cdrom_sp132.html Atoll list (in French)]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
