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Kahoʻolawe
Image:Kahoolawesatellite.jpg
Øgenavn The Target Isle
Befolkning Ubeboet
Område 115,595 km²
Rang 8., mindste ø i den hawaiianske øgruppe
Højeste punkt Lua Makika, 450 m
Øens blomster Lua Makika, 450 m

Kahoʻolawe er den mindste af de 8 store vulkanske øer der danner delstaten Hawaii. Den befinder sig 11,2 km sydvest for Maui og sydøst for Lānaʻi. Øen er 18 km lang . Det samlede areal er på 115.595 km². Øens højeste punkt er krateret Lua Makika, - højdepunktet på Puʻu Moaulanui - som er 450 m over havet. Kahoʻolawe er relativt tør pga. at den lave ø ikke modtager særlig meget nedbør fra de nordøstlige passater og i øvrigt ligger i regnskyggen af Maui's 3055 m høje vulkan Haleakalā.

United States Census Bureau definerer Kahoʻolawe som Block Group 9, Census Area 303.02 af Maui County. Der bor ingen permanente beboere på øen. [1]

[redigér] Historie

Et sted omkring år 1000 blev Kahoʻolawe beboet og der blev oprettet små, midlertidige fiskersamfund langs kysten. Nogle områder inde på fastlandet blev opdyrkede og der blev brudt fin basalt som blev brugt til stenværktøjer. Landet udviklede sig fra at være et tørt miljø med uregelmæssige vandløb til en åben savanne med græsområder og træer på grund af rydning af vegetation for brænde og landbrug. Folk byggede stenplatforme til religiøse ceremonier, rejste klippestykker som helligdomme til vellykkede fisketure, og indhuggede helleristninger, eller tegninger, i stenenes flade overflader. Disse rester fra en tidligere tid kan stadig findes på Kahoʻolawe.

Mens man ikke ved hvor mange mennesker der beboede øen, betyder manglen på frisk vand nok at det højst kunne være et par hundrede mennesker. Op til 100 eller flere mennesker kan engang have levet i Hakioawa, den største boplads beliggende på den nordøstlige side af øen med front mod Maui.

Violent wars among competing chiefs laid waste to the land and led to a decline in the population. During the War of Kamokuhi, Kalaniopuʻu, the ruler of the Island of Hawaiʻi, raided and pillaged Kahoʻolawe in an unsuccessful attempt to take Maui from Kamalalawalu, the King of Maui. From 1778 to the early 1800s, observers on passing ships reported that the island was uninhabited and barren, destitute of both water and wood. After the arrival of missionaries from New England, the Hawaiian government of King Kamehameha III replaced the death penalty with exile, and Kahoʻolawe became a male penal colony sometime around 1830. Food and water were scarce, some prisoners reportedly starved, and some swam across the channel to Maui to find food. The law making the island a penal colony was repealed in 1853.

An 1857 survey of Kahoʻolawe reported about 50 residents, about 5,000 acres (20 km²) of land covered with shrubs, and a patch of sugar cane. Along the shore, tobacco, pineapple, gourds, pili (pee-lee) grass and scrub trees grew. Beginning in 1858, the Hawaiian government leased Kahoʻolawe to a sequence of ranching ventures. Some proved more successful than others, but the lack of freshwater was an unyielding enemy. Through the next 80 years, the landscape changed dramatically—drought and uncontrolled overgrazing denuded much of the island, and strong trade winds blew away much of the topsoil leaving the red hard pan.

From 1910 to 1918 the Hawaiian Territorial government designated Kahoʻolawe as a forest reserve in hopes of restoring the island through a revegetation and livestock removal program. The program failed and leases again became available. In 1918, the skilled Wyoming rancher Angus MacPhee with the help of Maui landowner Harry Baldwin leased the island for 21 years, intending to build a cattle ranch. By 1932, the ranching operation was enjoying moderate success. After heavy rains, native grasses and flowering plants would sprout, but drought seemed to always return. In 1941, MacPhee subleased part of the island to the Army. Later that year, because of continuing drought, MacPhee removed his cattle from the island.

On Dec. 8, 1941, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. Army declared martial law throughout Hawaiʻi and took control of Kahoʻolawe. Soon, Kahoʻolawe was being used as a place to train Americans headed to war across the Pacific. The use of Kahoʻolawe as a training range was believed to be critical to the lives of many young Americans. The United States was executing a new type of war in the Pacific islands. Success depended on accurate, heavy gunfire from ships suppressing enemy positions as Marines and soldiers struggled to get ashore. Thousands of soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen prepared on Kahoʻolawe for the brutal and costly assaults on islands such as the Gilberts, the Marianas and Iwo Jima.

Training on Kahoʻolawe continued after World War II. During the Korean War, carrier-based aircraft played a critical role in attacking enemy airfields, convoys and troop staging areas. Mock-ups of airfields, vehicles and other camps were constructed on Kahoʻolawe, and while pilots were undergoing readiness inspection at nearby Barbers Point Naval Air Station, they practiced spotting and hitting the mock-ups at Kahoʻolawe. Similar training took place through the Cold War and during Vietnam, as mock-ups of aircraft, radar installations, gun mounts and surface-to-air missile sites were placed across the island for pilots and others to use for training.

In 1976, a group of individuals calling themselves the Protect Kahoʻolawe ʻOhana (PKO) filed suit in federal court to stop the Navy’s use of Kahoʻolawe for military training, to require compliance with a number of new environmental laws and to ensure protection of cultural resources on the island. In 1977, the Federal District Court for the District of Hawaii allowed the Navy’s use of the island to continue, but the Court directed the Navy to prepare an environmental impact statement and complete an inventory of historic sites on the island. On March 9, 1977, two PKO leaders, George Helm and Kimo Mitchell, were lost at sea during an attempt to occupy Kahoʻolawe in symbolic protest. In 1980, the Navy and the Protect Kahoʻolawe ʻOhana entered into a Consent Decree which allowed continued military training on the island, monthly access to the island for the PKO, surface clearance of part of the island, soil conservation, goat eradication and an archeological survey.

On March 18, 1981, the entire island was added to the National Register of Historic Places. At that time, the Kahoʻolawe Archaeological District was noted to contain 544 recorded archaeological or historic sites and over 2,000 individual features. As part of the soil conservation efforts, workers laid lines of explosive charges, detonating them to break the hardpan so that seedling trees could be planted. Used tires were taken to Kahoʻolawe and placed in miles of deep gullies to slow the washing of red soil from the barren uplands to the surrounding shores. Ordnance and scrap metal was picked up by hand and transported by large trucks to a collection site.

In 1990, President George H. W. Bush ordered an end to live-fire training on the island. The Department of Defense Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 1991 established the Kahoʻolawe Island Conveyance Commission to recommend terms and conditions for the conveyance of Kahoʻolawe by the United States government to the State of Hawaiʻi.


[redigér] Kahoʻolawe Island Reserve

In 1993, the Hawaiʻi State Legislature established the Kahoʻolawe Island Reserve, consisting of "the entire island and its surrounding ocean waters in a two mile (3 km) radius from the shore". By State Law, Kahoʻolawe and its waters can only be used for Native Hawaiian cultural, spiritual and subsistence purposes; fishing; environmental restoration; historic preservation; and education. Commercial uses are prohibited.

The Legislature also created the Kahoʻolawe Island Reserve Commission (KIRC) to manage the Reserve while it is held in trust for a future Native Hawaiian Sovereignty entity. The restoration of Kahoʻolawe will require a strategy to control erosion, re-establish vegetation, recharge the water table, and gradually replace alien plants with native species. Plans will include methods for damming gullies and reducing rainwater runoff. In some areas, non-native plants will temporarily stabilize soils before planting of permanent native species.

[redigér] References

  1. Block Group 9, Census Tract 303.02, Maui County United States Census Bureau