This Forbidden Hawaiian Island is Quietly Coming Back to Life

What the film says

1. Goats were introduced to Kahoʻolawe in 1793 (a gift from Captain Vancouver to Chief Kahekili of Maui).

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2. Kahoʻolawe is about 45 square miles.

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3. Nearly 3,000 archaeological and historical sites and features have been inventoried; Hawaiians arrived as early as 400 AD.

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4. The entire island is on the National Register of Historic Places (1981).

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5. The island is venerated as a body form (kinolau) of the ocean god Kanaloa.

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6. After Pearl Harbor the military took over the island for live-fire training; submarines fired torpedoes at the Kanapou cliffs.

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7. Vietnam-era training used replica North Vietnamese surface-to-air missile sites; ordnance included high explosives, napalm, and rockets.

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8. The National WWII Museum says the island has been called 'the most shot island in the world.'

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9. President George H. W. Bush ordered an end to the bombing in 1990.

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10. Congress authorized $400 million for ordnance removal (Title X, 1993); the Navy transferred title to the state in 1994, held for a future Native Hawaiian sovereign entity.

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11. An estimated 500–600 feral cats eat seabird eggs and chicks; the AI/drone Sentinel project tested on the island is on hold for lack of funding.

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12. About 1.9 million tons of soil erode from the island each year.

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13. A KIRC turtle-nest excavation in 2024 confirmed the island's first honu nest: 87 hatchlings (95%) emerged.

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14. A KIRC staffer called it 'the rebirth of Kahoʻolawe.'

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15. George Helm was one of the Kahoʻolawe Nine who landed on the island in January 1976. Helm, then 26, and Kimo Mitchell disappeared at sea on March 7, 1977.

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16. By law, the Kahoʻolawe reserve may be used only for traditional Native Hawaiian cultural, spiritual and subsistence purposes, environmental restoration, historic preservation and education.

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