Palmyra Atoll Totally Explained

Everything about Palmyra Atoll totally explained

Palmyra Atoll is an incorporated atoll administered by the United States government. The atoll is 4.6 square miles (12 km²), and it's located in the Northern Pacific Ocean at . Geographically, Palmyra is one of the Northern Line Islands (southeast of Kingman Reef and north of Kiribati Line Islands), located almost due south of the Hawaiian Islands, roughly halfway between Hawaii and American Samoa. Its 9 miles (14.5 km) of coastline has one anchorage known as West Lagoon. It consists of an extensive reef, two shallow lagoons, and some 50 sand and reef-rock islets and bars covered with vegetation—mostly coconut trees, Scaevola, and tall Pisonia trees.
The islets of the atoll are all connected, except Sand Island in the West and Barren Island in the East. The largest island is Cooper Island in the North, followed by Kaula Island in the South. The northern arch of islets is formed by Strawn Island, Cooper Island, Aviation Island, Quail Island, Whippoorwill Island, followed in the East by Eastern Island, Papala Island, and Pelican Island, and in the South by Bird Island, Holei Island, Engineer Island, Tananger Island, Marine Island, Kaula Island, Paradise Island and Home Island (clockwise). Average annual rainfall is approximately 175 inches (4,445 mm) per year. Daytime temperatures average 85°F (29°C) year round.

Political status

Palmyra is an incorporated territory of the United States, meaning that it's subject to all provisions contained in the United States Constitution and is permanently under U.S. sovereignty. However, it's also an unorganized territory as there's no Congressional act specifying how it should be governed; the only relevant law simply gives the President the discretion to administer the island as best seen fit (see Section 48 of the Hawaii Omnibus Act, Pub. L. 86–624, July 12, 1960, 74 Stat. 411, attached as a note to former sections 491 to 636 of Title 48, United States Code ).
   The issue of Palmyra's governance is generally a moot point, as there's no indigenous population remaining nor any reason to think that there will be one in the future. It remains therefore currently the only unorganized incorporated U.S. territory. It is privately owned by The Nature Conservancy and managed as a nature reserve, but administered from Washington, D.C. by the Office of Insular Affairs, United States Department of the Interior. The surrounding waters, out to the 12-mile (22.2 km) limit, were transferred to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, and designated as the Palmyra Atoll National Wildlife Refuge in 2001. Defense is the responsibility of the United States.
   For statistical purposes, Palmyra is grouped as one of the United States Minor Outlying Islands.
   There is no current economic activity on the island. Many of the roads and causeways on the atoll were built during World War II. All are now unserviceable and overgrown. There is a roughly 2,200 yard (2,000 m) long, unpaved and unimproved airstrip on Cooper Island (Palmyra Airport, ICAO code PLPA). Various abandoned World War II-era structures are found on the island.
   The atoll has been manned by a group of scientists, Nature Conservancy staff and volunteers, and Fish & Wildlife representatives (totalling between four and 20 in all) for the last several years. A series of improvements in 2004 consisted of new two-person bungalows and showers for the island's inhabitants. Water is collected from the roof of a concrete building not far from the main living area of the scientists. Communal buildings of the settlement on the north side of Cooper Island (the only one on the atoll) consist of a common cooking/dining building adjacent to the Atoll's only dock and a kayak and scuba equipment storage building next to the launch ramp.
   Palmyra Atoll's location in the Pacific Ocean, where the southern and northern currents meet, means that its beaches are littered with trash and debris. Plastic mooring buoys are particularly plentiful on the beaches of Palmyra, as well as plastic bottles for soft drinks, detergents, etc.
   Large parts of the Atoll are closed to any sort of public access due to the threat of uncleared World War II unexploded ordnance.

History

Palmyra was first sighted in 1798 by an American sea captain, Edmund Fanning of Stonington, Connecticut, while his ship the Betsy was in transit to Asia, but it was only later—on November 7, 1802—that the first western people landed on the uninhabited atoll. On that date, Captain Sawle of the U.S. ship Palmyra was wrecked on the atoll.
   Many believe the atoll's discovery by Fanning to have included a paranormal occurrence, which lends to the island's mysticism. Fanning's ship was under the command of the first mate at night while Fanning slept. Fanning awoke three times in the middle of the night, each time awaking out of bed. The third time, Fanning took it as a premonition and ordered the first mate to heave to. In the morning the ship resumed its travel, but only went a mile before reaching the reef of Palmyra. Had the ship continued its course at night, the entire crew might have perished.
   In 1859, Palmyra was claimed by Dr. Gerrit P. Judd of the brig Josephine for the American Guano Company and the United States, in accordance with the Guano Islands Act of 1856; however, the company never started mining for guano, because there was none to be mined. Palmyra is located close to the Intertropical Convergence Zone; there's too much rain for guano to accumulate. In the meanwhile, on February 26, 1862, Kamehameha IV (1834–1863), Fourth King of Hawaii (1854–1863), issued a commission to Captain Zenas Bent and Johnson B. Wilkinson, both Hawaiian citizens, to sail to Palmyra and to take possession of the atoll in the king's name and on April 15, 1862 it was formally annexed to the Kingdom of Hawaii.
   Captain Bent sold his rights to Palmyra to Mr. Wilkinson on December 24, 1862 and from 1862 to 1885, Kalama Wilkinson owned the island which was divided in 1885 between three heirs, two of which immediately transferred their rights to a certain Wilcox (?) who, in turn, transferred them to the Pacific Navigation Company. The latter entity made an attempt to colonize the atoll by sending a married couple to live there between September 1885 and August 1886.
   When Savio took over the atoll he appointed Roger Lextrait caretaker of the island, and Roger lived there full time for 8 years.
   In December 2000, most of the atoll was purchased by The Nature Conservancy,.

The Sea Wind murders

In 1974 Palmyra was the site of the notable double murder of Malcolm "Mac" Graham III and Eleanor LaVerne "Muff" Graham, covered extensively in the true crime novel And the Sea Will Tell by Vincent Bugliosi and Bruce B. Henderson. Duane ("Buck") Walker (now known as Wesley G. Walker) was found guilty of Muff's murder and served 22 years, paroled in September of 2007.
South African sailor Sharon Jordan beach combed on the island in 1981, and first found extensive newspaper clippings about the murders, and awoke from a dream certain that she'd discover the bodies. Several days later, a human skull and other bones fell out of a World War II vintage metal box that had washed up on the beach after a storm. The bones were determined to be that of murder victim Muff Graham. The most likely scenario was that the victims were first shot or stabbed. The dismembered body that was found had been burned with an acetylene torch and placed in a metal container that had been removed from one of the many scrap military rescue boats and then dumped into the lagoon. Mac Graham's remains have yet to be found, but were likely put in a similar container which may be discovered there one day, according to The Curse of Palmyra Island By Curt Rowlett http://www.strangemag.com/palmyra.html .

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