Farallon de Medinilla is a small island in the Northern Mariana Islands

Northern Mariana Islands

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , is a commonwealth in political union with the United States, occupying a strategic region of the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of 15 islands about three-quarters of the way from Hawaii to the Philippines...

 chain and is situated 45 nmi (83.3 km; 51.8 mi) north of Saipan

Saipan

Saipan is the largest island of the United States Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , a chain of 15 tropical islands belonging to the Marianas archipelago in the western Pacific Ocean with a total area of . The 2000 census population was 62,392...

. It is the second smallest in the chain; only Zealandia Bank

Zealandia Bank

Zealandia Bank is the name given to two rocky pinnacles, and the submarine volcano they rise from, in the Northern Mariana Islands chain situated 11 miles NNE of Sarigan. These two pinnacles are 1/2 mile apart from each other; one reaches more than a meter above sea level at low tide...

 is smaller. It is an uninhabited coral island which is 0.845 km² (0.326 sq mi, or 208.9 acres) in area. It is 2.8 km long from southwest to northeast. The southern part is up to 150 meters wide, and the northern part up to 520 meters. At its narrowest, where the northern and southern parts join, the island is only about 20 meters wide. Its highest elevation is 81 meters. The shores are rimmed with cliffs containing caves and its tableland has some brush and savanna grass. Politically, it is part of the Northern Islands Municipality

Northern Islands Municipality

Northern Islands Municipality is one of the four main political divisions of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. It consists of a long string of the northernmost islands of the Northern Marianas, including Farallon de Pajaros, the Maug Islands, Asuncion, Agrihan, Pagan, Alamagan,...

.

The island was discovered by Louis de Freycinet

Louis de Freycinet

Louis Claude de Saulces de Freycinet was a French navigator. He circumnavigated the earth, and was one of the first to produce a comprehensive map of the coastline of Australia.-Biography:...

 in 1819; it was named for Don Jose de Medinilla y Pifieda, the (Spanish) Governor of the Marianas from 1812-1822.

For years, the U.S.Navy has used Farallon de Medinilla for military and bombing exercises. In a 2002 lawsuit, the Center for Biological Diversity

Center for Biological Diversity

The Center for Biological Diversity based in Tucson, Arizona, is a nonprofit membership organization with approximately 220,000 members and online activists, known for its work protecting endangered species through legal action and scientific petitions...

 charged the Navy with the destruction of wildlife habitat on the island. A subsequent court ruling ordered the U.S. Defense Department to cease bombing exercises on Farallon de Medinilla until they came in compliance with the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

X marks the spot

Satellite imagery (e.g., Google Earth

Google Earth

Google Earth is a virtual globe, map and geographical information program that was originally called EarthViewer 3D, and was created by Keyhole, Inc, a Central Intelligence Agency funded company acquired by Google in 2004 . It maps the Earth by the superimposition of images obtained from satellite...

) of the island shows 3 X-shaped figures and one Y-shaped figure in its northern half, built out of metal shipping containers. These arrangements of shipping containers were left by the U.S. Navy for bomb targeting practice.