El Hierro Overview

El Hierro

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“Once together, always together.”

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Morpheus

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El Hierro is a nation originating in Thalassia but now active in Morpheus. There are currently 8.2 billion hard-working people living in El Hierro. The national animal of El Hierro is the critically endangered El Hierro Giant Lizard. El Hierro stems from a volcanic island which emerged from the ocean after three successive eruptions, but has expanded it's territories through conquest.

El Hierro is a socially progressive and atheist nation. The 8.2 billion El Hierroans care about safety, health and integrity. They enjoy great social equality and tend to see other capitalistic nations as immoral and corrupt.
The government mainly spends money on administration, education, defence, healthcare, industry and law & order. Crime in El Hierro is almost non-existent, especially among the youth of El Hierro.

Etymology
It is commonly thought that El Hierro means iron, the spanish translation of the word. But that’s not what the original islands name really means. The actual meaning isn’t known, although some believe it might be derived from the word strong.

History
Originally the ancient natives, Bimbaches, used to live on the island where El Hierro originated. The Bimbaches were subject to Spanish rule. This was done by the process of negotiation, and not necessarily by military action. The negotiator of Béthencourt, the Spanish ruler, was Augeron. He was captured by Europeans and served as a mediator between Europeans and Guanches. In return of control, Béthencourt promised to respect the liberty of the natives, but his son broke this promise by selling many Bimbaches to slavery. Many Frenchman and Galicians subsequently settled on El Hierro. There was a revolt against the harsh treatment of governor Vizcaíno, but it was suppressed.
From that point onwards, El Hierro maintained relatively peaceful to its oppressors and instead made use of them to acquire new technology. Through this, they became relatively advanced for a subject country, which lead to El Hierro gaining independence early. After their independence and the decline of major European powers El Hierro managed to fill the power vacuum and conquered land on the continent, and thus the nation was no longer just an island nation.

Landslides and tsunamis
At least three major landslides have affected El Hierro in the last few hundred thousand years. The most recent one was El Golfo, 15 thousand years ago. This involved the collapse of the western flank of the island. The landslide created the El Golfo valley and a debris avalanche. An analysis of these deposits suggests that the slope failure did not occur as a single event but a series of smaller failures over a few days. Local tsunamis most likely were triggered by this landslide.

Seismic activity
The Volcanological Institute of El Hierro seismic monitor detected increased seismic activity in 2011. In july there was an earthquake swarm of about 320 earthquakes. The activity increased, and the experts were afraid for landslides and volcanic activity. They made plans to evacuate the island if necessary. In October 2011 a small submarine eruption began, 7 km south of La Restinga. No real threats happened and the island didn’t need to be evacuated.

Geography/climate
The climate on the island of El Hierro is different in a few areas. It ranges from humid subtropical climate to mild semi-arid and mild desert climate. The average temperature is 13.5 degrees Celsius.
Mainland El Hierro enjoys a Mediterranean climate, characterised by dry summers and mild winters, with an average temperature of 16.3 degrees Celsius.

Geography, flora and fauna
El Hierros national animal, the El Hierro giant lizard, is one of the endangered animals on the island. Therefore there is a captive breeding programme, allowing its reintroduction.

The non-barren parts of the island rely on relief precipitation, not much more than the average of 19 rainfall days per year, high relative humidity and geothermal springs. This non-arid parts have thermophilous juniper clumps and a pine forest with other evergreens. In 2000, El Hierro was designated by the WA as a Biosphere Reserve, with 60% of its territory protected to preserve its natural and cultural diversity. This can also be seen in El Hierroan politics, where climate is an important issue. Among cetaceans in these waters, it is notable that several species of lesser known beaked whales inhabit around the island. El Hierro is volcanic and sharply mountainous. One eruption has to date been recorded on the island: from the Volcan de Lomo Negro vent in 1793. Except as landscaped at its harbour towns the shore is rocky and in places precipitous.
The island has approximately 70 caves and volcanic galleries, including the Cueva de Don Justo whose collection of channels exceeds 6 km. Landslides, plant erosion and seasonal wind erosion have reduced the size and height of the island. The current highest point of the Island is in the middle of the island, in Malpaso, 1501 meters high.

Government
The government of El Hierro has three branches, making use of the Trias Politica. Using this system, none of the branches is more powerful than the other. The first one is the legislative branch. The legislative branch is the parliament, who are elected by the people. The elected parliament votes on all bills and has, therefore, the last word when making laws. Then you have the executive power. These are the ministers. Once a law is passed, the ministers make sure it is implemented properly. They also have the right do draw up new laws. The ministers are assisted by civil servants who advise them on policy and the implementation of policy. The last branch is the judicial power. This branch consists of independent judges. Judges are appointed for life and cannot be dismissed, except if they commit a crime.

Military
El Hierro is a big military might, and occasionally uses this army in war, though it sometimes opts for more peaceful solutions too. This makes El Hierro unpredictable in its foreign policy and a nation to be careful with. El Hierro also claims the rights to Weapons of Mass Destruction and has a big arms manufacturing industry.

Economy
El Hierro has a GDP of 2,402 trillion euro’s. This is mainly lead by the Information Technology industry. But als Book Publishing, Tourism and Agriculture help the economy.
The citizens pay an average tax rate of 99.0% and this is higher for the wealthy. There is a very low unemployment rate of 0.6%. The average income is a stunning 293,024 euros and very evenly distributed.

Largest Cities

Rank	City	Metro area population	Municipality
1	Villa de Valverde	965.000.000	Valverde
2	El Pinar	860.000.000	Frontera
3	Las Puntas	705.000.000	Frontera
4	La Restinga	694.000.000	El Pinar
5	Sabinosa	683.900.000	Frontera
6	Taibique	667.000.000	El Pinar
7	Isora	623.000.000	Valverde
8	Guaracoza	598.000.000	Valverde
9	Tamaduste	596.850.000	Valverde
10	La Caleta	592.000.000	Valverde