A visit to the remote Pacific island ecosystem losing protections
Up First from NPR
This episode of Up First from NPR takes listeners on a journey to Palmyra Atoll, a remote Pacific island ecosystem that is part of the U.S. Marine National Monuments and home to thriving wildlife including seabirds,
Key takeaways
- Palmyra Atoll is one of the most pristine ecosystems in the world, largely untouched by human activity due to strict access controls.
- The atoll's protection as a Marine National Monument covers over a million square miles, making it the largest fully protected conservation area in the U.S.
Main topics
- Remote Pacific island ecosystems
- Marine National Monuments and conservation protection
Notable quotes
It's just watching nature do its thing without people interfering. And I think that it's a very unique opportunity to observe that.
Conclusion
Palmyra Atoll stands as a rare, untouched natural sanctuary in the Pacific Ocean, protected by decades of conservation efforts and scientific
Transcript preview
Speaker 3 (0:00) I'm Aisha Roscoe, and this is the Sunday Story from Up First. Way out in the Pacific Ocean, there are tiny islands known as atolls that few people have ever seen. They're home to some of the most pristine ecosystems in the world. These islands and atolls are U.S. territories, but no one lives there permanently. Really, they belong to the wildlife, like big colonies of seabirds, thriving coral reefs, and farther offshore, pods of melon-headed whales. Speaker 3 (0:47) The waters around these atolls are protected as U.S. Marine National Monuments. Together, they cover more than a million square miles of ocean. They're the country's largest fully protected conservation areas. Now the Trump administration is trying to change that. President Trump is opening some of these protected waters to commercial fishing. And this is reigniting a battle between the fishing industry and conservationists, as well as Native Hawaiians. NPR's Lauren Summer got some special permission to visit one of these atolls. Today on the show, she takes us to this wild, remote place. She reports on what's at stake and what it means for conservation across the U.S. Stay with us. Speaker 1 (1:42) This message comes from Bloomberg. Our Town, from Bloomberg's Big Take podcast, follows residents of Gainesboro, Tennessee, after a group of far-right Christians moves in with plans for a radical social experiment. Listen to Our Town wherever you get your podcasts. Speaker 6 (2:00) 1A is named for the First Amendment, which protects the freedom of the press and your freedom to speak out. Our Speaker 1 (2:05) weekly Speaker 6 (2:06) series, If You Can Keep It, tackles the big political stories of the day. And why they matter for our democracy. We answer your questions from what's at stake in the midterms to court reform to fixing wealth inequality. And beyond. Join me, Todd Zwilich. And me, Jen White, on the 1A podcast from WAMU and NPR. Speaker 1 (2:25) You know that nagging voice in your head, the one telling you to put the phone down and stop doom scrolling? Well, it's time. Look up. Take a daily curiosity break with Shortwave, NPR's science podcast. Let your mind wander to the edges of outer space or wonder about what's lurking in the depths of the seafloor, all in under 15 minutes. Shortwave, your daily mental reset. Listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Speaker 3 (2:48) We're back with a Sunday story. I'm with reporter Lauren Summer, who recently traveled to one of the world's most remote ocean atolls. Hi, Lauren. Hey, Aisha. So you took this trip to the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Describe where you went. and how you got there. Speaker 2 (3:10) Yeah, so I went to Palmyra Atoll. It's about a thousand miles south of Hawaii. It's about as far from a continent that you can get on the planet. And it's definitely not a place where you can go like book a ticket online to get there. It took months for me to get permissions to go because it's a national wildlife refuge that's off limits to the general public. Speaker 2 (3:32) And, you know, even packing took me some extra work, which actually started in my kitchen. Okay, so now my clothes, my shoes, everything is bagged. So I had to dig through my freezer, you know, make some space, pull out all that old, like, crusty ice cream. Because everything I was bringing with me needed to be frozen in advance for 48 hours. No, I can't close the freezer. Speaker 3 (4:00) Yeah. I mean, our freezer is always jam packed with like, you know, pizza bites and pizza bagels for the kids. So I understand that. Why in the world did you have to freeze your clothes? Speaker 2 (4:14) Yeah, so the idea is to kill off any hitchhikers. So these are like bugs or seeds that might actually get brought with me that are not supposed to be on Palmyra Atoll. So, you know, I had all my Ziploc stuff all frozen, and then I took a flight to Honolulu. And then I got on a small charter jet that makes the two-hour flight to Palmyra, you know, once or twice a month at most. Speaker 2 (4:38) You know, as we came into land, I could see this bright turquoise water surrounded by this deep blue Pacific Ocean. The atoll is actually a ring of low-lying islands, and it's small. It's only a little more than four square miles. And right when I got off the plane, they changed the sign that said what the local population is. Speaker 8 (4:59) He's updating the population sign for the station. So from 21 to 22. Speaker 7 (5:06) This is Chris Ryan. He's the Palmyra Atoll Preserve Manager. The Speaker 8 (5:09) lowest I've seen is seven, which is very nice, but very quiet. I Speaker 3 (5:13) mean, that does sound like a very peaceful and quiet place with that few people. But who exactly is at this, you know, station? Speaker 7 (5:24) Yeah, so the research station is run by the Nature Conservancy, which is a conservation nonprofit. They have some staff there. And then there's also folks from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. And they do, you know, wildlife monitoring, scientific research, and they're also helping restore the atoll. And people tend to kind of come in and they rotate in for three to six months at a time. When Speaker 8 (5:44) the space station was going overhead, that was our closest human neighbor for a little while. That was pretty neat. Speaker 3 (5:52) That is pretty neat. You really have to like isolation, I would think, to take that job. Oh, Speaker 2 (5:59) yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of a prerequisite. It's like a personality type. But Ryan says, you know, that solitude, it gives you this window into the natural world that you never would get otherwise. Speaker 8 (6:10) It's just watching nature do its thing without people interfering. And I think that it's a very unique opportunity to observe that. That's to me the most important part about Palmyra. Speaker 2 (6:23) So Palmyra is densely vegetated, you know, lots of tropical forest and a lot of humidity. I mean, it rained a ton when I was there. Speaker 3 (6:33) You know, humidity could be a lot, you Speaker 2 (6:37) know. Speaker 3 (6:37) It could be. So because it gets humid here in D.C., I would imagine this is probably a bit more. Speaker 2 (6:44) It was a level that I've never experienced. I mean, I was soaked pretty much the entire time I was there. I Speaker 3 (6:51) got to ask you this because I don't know much about this. What makes it an atoll instead of an island? Speaker 2 (6:58) It's a basic question, right? Speaker 7 (6:59) So an atoll is a ring of islands because it actually formed from an ancient volcano that was surrounded by a coral reef. And this kind of volcanic island in the middle, it eroded away under the sea, but the coral reef around it continues to grow. So Speaker 8 (7:15) everything that we're on here, everything that we stand on here is on a base of dead coral, like coral skeletons. And then the fringing reef continues to expand out. Speaker 7 (7:24) Palmyra Atoll was actually once part of the Kingdom of Hawaii. So when the U.S. annexed Hawaii, Palmyra came with