Many thanks to the KIRC staff for allowing me access to the island, especially Kui

Gapero the cultural division manager for hooking me up with understanding of the

island on a cultural level, and Carmella Noneza the KIRC’s GIS/IT manager for assisting

me in not only acquiring the data for this project, but motivating me to pursue a career

in GIS. Sarah Mclane for guiding all of us students through 150 and 180 and giving us

the knowledge to succeed in this field. Finally thanks to you for reading this whole

presentation, hope you take away some knowledge from this project, Aloha!

It was only a year ago that I first set foot on Kahoolawe. We have all heard the

stories, maybe even be old enough to remember the shaking that would pulse

through Maui when a bomb or rocket would detonate on island. What was left

behind after the goats, and ranching, the bombing, and the cleanup was a

remote desolate shell of her former self. Even so I consider myself lucky to be

chosen to go to this island just for the opportunity to give back. Using this GIS

course as my way, my medium of showing my respect and hopefully healing the

wounds of Kahoolawe.

Acknowledgements

Introduction

The methods I plan on using to save as many site as possible include unifying,

and intersecting Data layers provided from the KIRC, our teacher, and the data I have

gone out to island to collect to try and not only portray the danger these site are in, but

maybe how we can fix or at least slow the damage being caused to the sites.

Problem Statement

The “Problem” I present wasn’t show much hard to find, as it was hard

to pick “which one”. There was so many problems that I feel GIS could help fix

on Kahoolawe. The one problem I settled on was the “saving” of cultural sites

located on island.

While there are over 3000 unique features and sites around the island as

far as cultural and archeological sites, there are varying degrees of importance,

and even more important varying degrees of danger that certain sites may be in.

Dangers to a “site” may include things like wind and water erosion; in

many areas all of the topsoil has run off leaving the “hardpan” under it exposed.

This hardpan does nothing to stop wind and rain water so as it continues to

build up it can and has literally wash away entire sites. Another danger is the

Unexploded Ordinance (UXO) left over after the military’s’ use of the island. The

multi-million dollar clean up still left approximately 33% of the land uncleared,

and only 10% of the island able to be used heavily (able to dig, use heavy

machinery, etc), also 100% of the coastline was left uncleared. A final danger is

funding, as the Kahoolawe Island Reserve Commission is slowing using up the

last of their money without any relief in sight. As per the laws currently, the

island cannot be used for any commercial purpose therefore has no real way of

producing income for itself yet.

Methodology

From top left heading clockwise:

-Sailors Hat

-Astrological / Birthing Stone

-Petroglyphs

-The Hardpan

Results, Discussion & Implications

I realize that this task is monumental to say the least, but I view myself as just

cog in a greater machine. If we can all take this knowledge provided from the GIS field

and use it to eventually save not only these sites but in the process Kahoolawe as a

whole.

As the famous patriot for the island George Helm once said, "There is man and

there is environment. One does not supersede the other. The breath in man is the breath

of Papa. Man is merely the caretaker of the land that maintains his life and nourishes his

soul. Therefore, the ʻâina is sacred. The church of life is not in a building, it is the open

sky, the surrounding ocean, the beautiful soil...." (Helm) That kind of sums up my

purpose here, we are not made to own the land but to take care of it, and learn from it.

The island of Kahoolawe has been to a rough history, it has been everything

from a place to store goats, a penal colony, ranch land, a military training site (or place

of illegal occupation depending on the viewpoint); all the way to war-torn shadow of an

island (or the possible re-birth place of a Kingdom depending on the viewpoint). As a

Veteran of the United States Navy, I understand the need of a training area to hone a

fleet’s skill to perform as the “World’s Greatest Navy”. As a Hawaiian by blood, I also

understand the plight of using a once sacred island as a plaything just to see things go

BOOM!

But way more important than the other two things that I am, is that I

understand what is done is done. You cannot go back in time and stop what happened,

and wasting time and Mana on kicking a dead horse is unnecessary. What we can and

should do is find and use technology (like GIS) to help heal the island.

Results I hope to find are to try and lay out a “battle-plan” to possibly stop or

slow the erosion so that either more generations can enjoy or learn about/from these

sites or further action can be taken to save the sites permanently. The main thing is to

provide a learning place for the future.

The things I hope to achieve doing this project are, to raise awareness about the

island. Everyone in Hawaii knows about the island but do they know the real dangers it

is in? Also with increased awareness is get the attention of the law makers. Without their

help in funding, these programs that rely on that money would quickly fade into pages

of history along with the island as a whole. The future generations will never get the

chance to do what I did; set foot on the island, gain knowledge from the island, and

most importantly give back to the island.

•(ESRI) "ArcGIS | Main." ArcGIS | Main. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2015.

•"George Helm." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2015.

•Burlingame, Burl. "Man of Song Died Pursuing Sovereignty." Honolulu Star-

Bulletin Local News. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Apr. 2015.

Saving Kaho`olaweBy Brandon Kaimiola Speelman

GIS 180 – Ecosystem Management

References

Figure 2: UXO Clearance Map. As you can see with 33% of the island inaccessible due to

explosives; majority of these areas haven’t even searched for Archeological/ Cultural sites, let

alone know if they are in danger from erosion

Figure 1: This Central Map shows a “hillshade” as the base layer, with the more than 3000 different Archeological and Cultural sites

scattered around the island. At the corners you will see zoomed in areas of concentrations of sites that are of interest to be studied

and/or in danger of being destroyed.

Figure 4 – This map shows the `Ili boundaries, Road system, and

riverbeds over a “visible light” spectrum basemap.

Figure 3 – For this map, I used multi-band imagery that shows the vegetation of the island in a

pink hue; while the desolate “hardpan” is tinted green. Also I dropped in the points that I

actually took while on island including:

Basecamp – our base of operations

Sailors Hat – a site used by the U.S. Navy where they detonated 500 tons of TNT to study blast

effects, and leave a gaping crater in the island

Petroglyphs- just a small sample of the artwork left behind by the ancient Hawaiians

Navigators Seat- the one place in the state where you can see every island in the chain except

Kauai and Ni`ihau

Lua Makika- a site in the main crater of the island where the KIRC is starting a nursery to

hopefully restore native plants to the island

Gulch Start- the very beginning of a gulch that is washing away tons of earth every rainfall, and

posing a threat to those Petroglyphs south of it.

Astrological/Birthing Stone- a large flat bell stone with carvings and other man-made features

that’s unique to not only the state but the entire Pacific; is also teetering on the edge of the

aforementioned Gulch.

Photo by: Tony Novak-Clifford