Foulness Island passing of the Ministry of Defence Act 1946 and the subsequent rationalisation of five agencies in 1971, ownership of the island passed from the War Office to the Ministry of Defence. In 2003, a contract to manage the testing of munitions was awarded to the defence contractors QinetiQ, and they also control access to the island. In the 1850s, the South Essex Estuary and Reclamation Company proposed a grand scheme to reclaim around of land on the Essex coast, which would have included most of Foulness Sands and Maplin Sands. The civil engineer Sir John Rennie produced the plans, and
Suemez Island Suemez". Dionisio Alcalá Galiano called it "Guemes" in his map published in 1802, which may be the proper spelling. The name "Guemes" honors Juan Vicente de Güemes Padilla Horcasitas y Aguayo, Viceroy of New Spain from 1789 to 1794. Suemez Island Suemez Island is an island in the Alexander Archipelago of southeastern Alaska, United States. It lies just off the west-central coast of Prince of Wales Island. The northern tip of Dall Island lies to its southeast, while Baker Island lies to its northwest. Suemez Island has a land area of 151.713 km² (58.5768 sq mi) and was unpopulated at