St. Kitts

Saint Kitts, officially the Saint Christopher Island, is an island in the West Indies. The west side of the island borders the Caribbean Sea, and the eastern coast faces the Atlantic Ocean. Saint Kitts and the neighbouring island of Nevis constitute one country: the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis. Saint Kitts and Nevis are separated by a shallow channel known as "The Narrows".

Saint Kitts became home to the first Caribbean British and French colonies in the mid-1620s. Along with the island of Nevis, Saint Kitts was a member of the British West Indies until gaining independence on 19 September 1983.

The island is one of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles. It is situated about southeast of Miami, Florida, US. The land area of Saint Kitts is about , being approximately long and on average about across.

Saint Kitts has a population of about 40,000, the majority of whom are of African descent. The primary language is English, with a literacy rate of approximately 98%. Residents call themselves Kittitians.

Brimstone Hill Fortress National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the largest fortress ever built in the Western Caribbean. The island of Saint Kitts is home to the Warner Park Cricket Stadium, which was used to host 2007 Cricket World Cup matches. This made Saint Kitts and Nevis the smallest nation to ever host a World Cup event. Saint Kitts is also home to several institutions of higher education, including Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine, Windsor University School of Medicine, and the University of Medicine and Health Sciences.

Geography

The capital of the two-island nation, and also its largest port, is the town of Basseterre on Saint Kitts. There is a modern facility for handling large cruise ships there. A ring road goes around the perimeter of the island with smaller roads branching off it; the interior of the island is too steep for habitation.

Saint Kitts is away from Sint Eustatius to the north and from Nevis to the south. St. Kitts has three distinct groups of volcanic peaks: the North West or Mount Misery Range; the Middle or Verchilds Range and the South East or Olivees Range. The highest peak is Mount Liamuiga, formerly Mount Misery, a dormant volcano 1,156 m high.

Geology

The youngest volcanic center is Mt. Liamuiga, 5 km in diameter and rising to an elevation of 1155 m. Its last eruption was 1620 years ago, corresponding with the Steel Dust series of pyroclastic deposits on the western flank. The Mansion Series of pyroclastic deposits and andesite with basalt layers occur on the northern flank, along with mudflows. This volcano has a crater 900 m wide and 244 m deep, plus two distinct parasitic domes consisting primarily of andesite, Brimstone Hill and Sandy Point Hill which is coalesced with Farm Flat. Brimstone Hill is noted for having limestone on its flanks, which was dragged upward with the formation of the dome 44,400 years ago. Mt. Liamuiga partially overlays the Middle Range to the southeast. This Middle Range is another stratovolcano 976 m in height with a small summit crater containing a lake. Next in line is the 900 m South East Range, 1 Myr in age, consisting of four peaks. Ottley's dome and Monkey Hill dome are on the flanks, while the older volcanoes represented by Canada Hills, and Conaree Hills lie past the airport and Basseterre on the southeast flank. The Salt Dome Peninsula contains the oldest volcanic deposits, 2.3–2.77 Myr in age, consisting of at least nine Pelean domes rising up to 319 m in height, which includes Williams Hill and St. Anthony's Peak.

History

During the last ice age, the sea level was up to lower and St. Kitts and Nevis were one island along with Saba and Sint Eustatius (also known as Statia).

St. Kitts was originally settled by pre-agricultural, pre-ceramic "Archaic people", who migrated south down the archipelago from Florida. In a few hundred years they disappeared, to be replaced by the ceramic-using and agriculturalist Saladoid people around 100 BC, who migrated to St. Kitts north up the archipelago from the banks of the Orinoco River