Phoenix Islands Protected Area

In the middle of the Pacific, about halfway between Hawaii and Fiji, the Phoenix Islands anchor an ocean wilderness of 408,250 square kilometres — coral atolls, 14 submerged seamounts and deep-sea plains where ecosystems still function much as they did before human contact. Sharks, tuna, some 200 coral and 500 fish species and vast seabird colonies thrive here. UNESCO inscribed the protected area in 2010 as Kiribati's first World Heritage Site and one of the planet's great marine reserves.