The Renard Islands are an archipelago in the Solomon Sea . Administratively they belong to

Milne Bay Province Milne Bay is a province of Papua New Guinea. Its capital is Alotau. The province covers 14,345 km2 of land and 252,990 km2 of sea, within the province there are more than 600 islands, about 160 of which are inhabited. The province has ...

in the southeastern region of

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

History

The islands were encountered by the French explorer

Antoine Bruni d'Entrecasteaux Antoine Raymond Joseph de Bruni, chevalier d'Entrecasteaux (; 8 November 1737 – 21 July 1793) was a French Navy officer, explorer and colonial administrator who served as the Governor of Isle de France (Mauritius), governor of Isle de Fran ...

on 13 June 1793 and he named them îles Renard. American

artillery batteries In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, etc., so grouped to fac ...

were placed on the islands during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

.''Glen Innes Examiner'', 8 July 1943, p.1
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Geography

The Renard Islands are located in the north of

Louisiade Archipelago The Louisiade Archipelago is a string of ten larger volcanic islands frequently fringed by coral reefs, and 90 smaller coral islands in Papua New Guinea. It is located 200 km southeast of New Guinea, stretching over more than and spread o ...

, north of the barrier reef of

Vanatinai Vanatinai Island (also called Tagula and Sudest, for the names of the extreme capes of the island) is a volcanic island in the southeast of the Louisiade Archipelago within Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea. The reef-fringed island is approxi ...

and southeast of Misima. The small Manuga Reef, which is located 19 km southeast of Renard Islands, is part of the Renard Ward. The Renard Islands are located on a wide sandbank in a rectangular shape. The largest islands in the group are Kimuta (), Niva Beno () and Oreia (). Kimuta Island is long, with widths averaging at . The hilly island rises up to above the sea level. The islands of Niva Beno and Topuna are lying east of Kimuta. Bagaium is a tiny island (less than ) about southwest of Kimuta. On the northwest side of the bank several reefs including the islands Baiwa (), Pana Wadai () and Pana Roran (). On the southeast side of the sandbank are the islands of Oreia ( southeast of Kimuta) and Epoko (, southeast of Kimuta). Both islands are located in the center of small reef lagoon.

Population

According to the 2014 census, the island group had 617 inhabitants, spread over two villages on the main island Kimuta: Awa (345, in the east) Atuatua (272 in the West) Several sources claim that there is a family from Kimuta that actually lives yearly on the island of Niva Beno.

References

Archipelagoes of Papua New Guinea Islands of Milne Bay Province Louisiade Archipelago {{PapuaNewGuinea-island-stub