Kuaihelani is a landscape of contradictions. Here are the crumbling reminders of nations at war- infrastructure built hastily to accommodate a rapidly changing globe. Masses of rusting and twisted steel, tangles of copper protruding from the dunes, shattered concrete calving into the surf, and miles of flaking iron holding back the sea. This place was once a buzzing outpost in the wartime pacific, willed into existence by the heavy hand of men who did not have the luxury to consider the fate of its original inhabitants. Yes, the wildlife here had a rough go for many decades.
But thankfully the priorities for this small atoll have finally done a 180. Now, nearly all decisions made here are made purely with the wildlife in mind, and the USFWS has done a phenominal job at restoring the ecological function of the island with a very small budget. But it doesnʻt eliminate the fact that those physical reminders of the past are still very much present, and are now, for better or worse, part of the daily life of any given animal here at Kuaihelani. On any given day, one can see an albatross chick nested up on the remnant slabs of an old runway, or a monk seal hauled out on the concrete side of a machine-gunnerʻs pillbox, now fallen over into the sea. Or a manu o kū, who laid its egg in the crook of a long-forgotten rusty pipe. It speaks to the resilience of wildlife, that even in the presence of extreme human modification, life can find a way not just to live with it, but actually to thrive. Kauihelani is, without question, the most abundant place I've ever been. It is inspiring.
That said, I think we humans could probably learn a thing or two from these animals about dealing with rusty war wreckage. On the south side of Eastern Island, where we worked today, there are about 20 or 30 sharp steel spikes, driven into the bottom of the ocean at a rakish angle just offshore of the beach. Their tips lurk just below the waterʻs surface, and over the last 80 years, marine growth has turned them the same color as the rest of the bottom, making them very hard to see until you are right on top of them. These spikes were meant, presumably, to deter an amphibious assault of the island.
Our PMDP operation very much resembles an amphibious operation, and Iʻll tell you what, they are working. Encountering these spikes in our inflatable Zodiac boats sends our heartbeats racing and the coxswains scrambling for reverse gear. At this point, we thought we had mapped them all with GPS points, marked with big exclamation points and “SPIKE” on our screens. But, two more encounters today revealed two more unmapped spikes to add to the party. Don't worry about our safety though. When weʻre around these hazards, we boat in slow motion.
Today was another very productive day of shoreline cleanups. Weʻre behind on weighing our super sacks though, so we donʻt have a running total yet for the mission. We should be caught up by tomorrow, so weʻll have a sense for where weʻre at tomorrow night, but the team has been very very productive. Tomorrow, we don our wetsuits and get in the water to tackle cleaning the reefs. Itʻs still spring up here in the higher latitudes, so everyone is going to be layering up to withstand the water temps in the high 60ʻs.
With warm aloha,
Kevin