Northwestern Islands a ship graveyard
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Science Writer
The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are an archaeological treasure containing dozens of untouched shipwrecks and plane crash sites that lie ready to reveal their secrets, said Hans Van Tilburg, a University of Hawai'i marine archaeologist.
Hans Van Tilburg photo
In addition to a number of known wrecks, a recent survey of the sites discovered several more. Some wrecks appear to date back nearly two centuries to the days when wooden whaling ships were common in Hawaiian waters.
The wreck of the Japanese fishing vessel Kaiyo Maru No. 25 lies on the beach at Laysan Island, one of dozens of wrecked ships scattered among the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
The low-lying islands were a nightmare to shipping. Most have never had warning lights, and at night a ship could sail right onto the reef. The area also was incorrectly mapped on early navigation charts.
"Kure, which used to be known as Ocean Island, was notorious for being poorly located on charts," Van Tilburg said.
The victims included ships that hauled coal under sail from Australia to San Francisco, ships that mined guano on the islands more than a century ago, and, more recently, a number of fishing boats from fleets that ply the mid-Pacific.
"The most fantastic aspect is that some of those sites are very old and relatively intact because they have never been looted," said Van Tilburg, who led a three-person team on a monthlong survey that began in September and covered the area from Nihoa, just beyond Kaua'i, to Kure, 1,400 miles to the west-northwest.
One wreck, lying in the lagoon at Kure Atoll, was of a wooden ship more than 150 years old. Van Tilburg said it is probably a whaling ship — perhaps the Gledstanes, lost in 1837, or the Parker, which went down in 1842. In each case, surviving crew members made it to a sandy island within the lagoon, built a boat and sailed to the main Hawaiian Islands.
"Multiple anchors, chains, fasteners, rigging, equipment, bricks, copper sheathing, etc. were scattered on the bottom and photographed, filmed and sketched," Van Tilburg wrote in a summary of the team's findings.
"This is the best-preserved and most historically intriguing site discovered ... Wreck sites like this are time capsules from a previous era and can reveal information about the crews, the trades and the lifestyles found in the 19th century Pacific," he said.
Hans Van Tilburg photo
Many wrecks may have gone up on the windward reefs of the atoll, and then parts of them may have been driven in storms and high waves over the edge of the reef into the lagoon, where calmer waters protected them from further damage. That may be what happened with the wooden wreck on Kure, he said.
Archaeologists believe this anchor, in the lagoon at Kure Atoll, is from a wooden whaling ship that wrecked in the 1800s.
The wreck of the fishing ship Kaiyo Maru No. 25, on the reef at Laysan Island, shows the effects of constant exposure to the surf. Although the wreck is fairly recent, the ship's steel-hull is being torn apart by the pounding waves.
Van Tilburg said he has documented 50 ships known to have been wrecked on the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, the earliest at Pearl and Hermes Atoll in 1922. But during the survey, there was tantalizing evidence of wrecks that no one knew about.
At Necker, or Mokumanamana Island, the crew found iron artifacts marking a possible wreck that has never been documented.
The archaeology team, which included anthropology student Suzanne Finney and marine science student Marc Hughes, recorded the wrecks they found, but did not bring back samples. That's for future marine archaeological expeditions, Van Tilburg said.
They surveyed 16 shipwrecks and 16 anchors, some associated with the shipwrecks, as well as two aircraft crash sites. One was found in about 60 feet of water on the outer reef of Kure Atoll and appeared to be a Navy Corsair.
Van Tilburg said that although Corsairs were used during World War II, there were no Corsairs in the famed Battle of Midway, so the plane probably went down late in the war or afterward.
The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are under the control of a jumble of government agencies, but their management could be simplified if agencies are successful in having them designated a national marine sanctuary.
Robert Smith, coordinator of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve, said one goal is to unify oversight and protection of the islands and reefs.
He said an understanding of the marine archaeology of the site is an important part of that.
"We are committed to supporting research and exploration that will lead to an increase in understanding and protection of submerged artifacts found within waters of this remote region," Smith said.
