Could Ewa's Huge Underground Karst Waterways And Caves Really Exist?

Could Ewa's Huge Underground Karst Waterways And Caves Really Exist?

John Bond,  Kanehili Cultural Hui

 

 

Of course they do and there is lots of evidence of it for anyone who wants to look or listen to Hawaiian oral histories. Hawaiians were not "making it up" when they described the existence of these ancient cave systems.

By all logic and evidence around the world where there has been ancient coral reefs called karst the answer is most definitely YES. In addition Hawaii already has known huge lava tubes that feed large amounts of water into the sea, such as on the Big Island of Hawaii.

The Big Island doesn't have a reef system like the older islands such as Oahu and Maui where there are large reef shelves. In the huge 25 square mile Ewa Plain which is attached to the ancient Waianae volcano the lava tubes became connected through the ancient reef to the shoreline. In some cases the fresh mountain water bubbled up as springs on the land surface or as large underwater outlets that became sea caves and sinkholes called blue holes. 

As the Ewa Plain reef extends towards the sea it reaches a depth of approximately 1000 feet, providing ample room for large sea cave systems that have never been seen or explored.

Native Hawaiian oral histories describe huge underground caves running under Oahu connecting different locations. Some caves are fresh waterways, others are salt water portals for sharks and some are walkable large lava tubes. The Big Island, which is the Hawaiian Island chain's newest island without a reef, has some of the largest known caves.

As a recognized historical and cultural expert, Mr. Lee contends that Ewa, Oahu contain a "huge" series of "cave systems" - carved out by underground fresh water - and the caves were used by ancient Hawaiians for their burials long ago. These "cave systems" contain the "iwi" remains of the ancient Hawaiian Chiefs of Oahu, Maui, and Kauai Islands in Hawaii

These Ewa, Oahu "caves" are called "Waipouli Kupuna", and this is where Mr. Lee's family (plus many other Hawaiian families) are buried. They continue to destroy/desecrate the dead, history, culture, AND CONSTITUTION of Hawaii.

Yes, there is very ample evidence around the world that huge karst caves exit. On the Big Island there are also huge lava tube waterways and caves!

The Ewa Plain was a vast coral cave and sinkhole complex used for growing food, overnight shelter, burials and cool storage from the sun. This is how ancient Hawaiians could traverse the ancient Honouliuli ahupua'a trails, which early western explorers saw as barren and hostile. The food, the rest stops and wayside barter shops were there serving the travelers along the way.

The ancient coral reef sinkholes

Not many today know that Pohukaina in downtown Honolulu is actually an Ali'i coral burial cave

This UH SOEST image shows how fresh water erodes channels and pits (caves and sinkholes) into the coral reef creating what the Ewa Plain looked like many thousands of years ago when sea level was much higher than it currently is today.

Modern karst cave explorers inside the Moilili coral cave near the UH Manoa campus

Many people have visited the Moilili caves over the past 100 years. Pumping out the ground water in the 1930's caused a massive cave collapse in the Moilili area, greatly reducing the amount of the cave area that can be explored today. 

Inside a cave in Ewa by Roosevelt Avenue in former Barbers Point one can still see and identify Porites lobata coral inside the cave. Other bright colored coral species can still be seen in other karst coral caves in the area. Caves in Ewa contain a great deal of archaeological information, including ancient bird skeletons, but they are routinely bulldozed and filled with concrete grout by land developers today with little if any scientific study. 

Coral karst caves can get very, very huge in other parts of the world where vast amounts of tropical rains and rivers carved out vast underground tunnels over the centuries as sea levels dropped.

Huge caves like these very likely exist under the Ewa Plain where the coral shelf is known to go down 1000 feet near the shoreline. This is why in downtown Honolulu, which is also built on an ancient coral reef, large concrete piles being driven will sometimes just suddenly slip and completely disappear into what some only want to call a "void." No one in the construction industry wants to know what is really going on below the ground on Oahu.

Oahu's Ewa Plain Karst Sinkholes And Caves Yield Extinct Bird Fossils

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2015/01/ewa-plain-karst-sinkholes-and.html

US Fish Wildlife Demonstrates How Ewa Plain Karst Can Be Restored

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2014/12/us-fish-wildlife-ewa-preserve.html

The Ewa Plain Karst is the largest of several karsts on the island of Oahu

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2014/12/Ewa-Karst-largest-on-Oahu.html

Ewa Plain Karst Discoveries: Extinct Bird Species' Fossils Are Found At US Fish & Wildlife Kalaeloa Refuge

Ewa Plain Karst Discoveries: Extinct Bird Species' Fossils Are Found At US Fish & Wildlife Kalaeloa Refuge

An unexpected discovery of rare avian fossil remains, believed to be thousands of years old, has scientists excited.

July 28, 2009   Honolulu Star-Bulletin

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service workers and scientists doing coastal habitat restoration work at Kalaeloa recently discovered fossilized remains, including those of several extinct bird species.
"The discovery of these ancient bird bones, including several species now extinct and maybe even new species not known before, is a great reminder of the truly unique history and wonderful diversity of Hawaii's birds," said refuge manager David Ellis in a prepared statement.

Both the Bishop Museum and the Smithsonian Institution are categorizing and preserving the bones. Although the age of the bones has yet to be pinpointed through the use of radiocarbon dating, scientists noted that bird fossils found at similar sites on the Ewa Plain date to about 1,000 to 8,000 years ago.

The bird bones were discovered while scientists were restoring tidal pools that were once part of the former Barbers Point Naval Station, now the Pearl Harbor National Wildlife Refuge-Kalaeloa Unit.
Scientists have found remains of an extinct hawk—the first reported as a fossil on Oahu—a long-legged owl, Hawaiian sea eagle, petrel, two species of crow, Hawaiian finches, Hawaiian honeyeaters and the moa nalo—a flightless gooselike duck.

"These fossils of extinct birds give us a glimpse of an earlier time on Oahu when the lowlands teemed with native birds, insects, and plants," said Helen James, a research zoologist and curator of birds for the Smithsonian, in a written statement. "Lamentably, the birds cannot be brought back to life, but by studying their bones we at least gain an appreciation of Oahu's rich natural heritage."

According to Sheila Conant, an associate zoology professor at the University of Hawaii, researchers can use fossil records "to tell us about what it was like before people got here, and what it was like over time as they arrived and as population increased."

"I'm always delighted when someone finds a new fossil, especially when it's something interesting," Conant said. "To know that we had a diversity of birds before people got here is exciting for me."

Leonard Freed, also an associate UH zoology professor, added that researchers can use information from the discovery to gain a better knowledge in what types of characteristics shaped their environment.

"The fossil birds suggest that the characteristics may be shaped in an earlier environment," Freed said. "At minimum the fossils show that the diversity of birds in Hawaii was much greater than what has been documented historically."

Oahu's Ewa Plain Karst Sinkholes And Caves Yield Extinct Bird Fossils

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2015/01/ewa-plain-karst-sinkholes-and.html

US Fish & Wildlife Demonstrates How Ewa Plain Karst Can Be Restored

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2014/12/us-fish-wildlife-ewa-preserve.html

Ancient Karst Reef Sinkholes On The Ewa Plain Hold Secrets To Oahu’s Earliest Residents

Looking Back by Looking Down 

By Chad Pata, August 22, 2014  Go Kapolei Magazine

http://gokapoleimagazine.com/history/looking-back-looking/

In general, sinkholes are created over centuries as the acidity of rainwater eats away at the limestone, causing underground caverns to form and eventually give way to the weight of the earth above them.

Here in Kapolei, anyone who has ever put a shovel in the ground knows that the entire plain is made up of an ancient reef that dried up as ocean waters receded 120,000 years ago. This weathered karst, as it is known, is a limestone substrate that through the centuries was eaten away by the rains creating thousands of vertical bell-shaped caves or sinkholes.

While they are—geologically speaking—of some interest, their true value comes from their unintended ability to serve as a trap for animals. Due to their vertical nature, once a creature found itself in such a place, there was little chance of escape as scaling the walls was impossible and rare is the bird that can hover straight up like a helicopter to escape these narrow confines.

So what we had was a perfect repository to collect fossils of the wildlife that occupied these islands long before the Polynesians ever set foot on this volcanic chain.

Unfortunately, 99 percent of these “fossil tombs” have either been bulldozed for agricultural lands, lain over with concrete for development or simply lost to the ever-shifting sands of time, which brings us back to our little six-acre plot in Kapolei.

They were first discovered in the 1970s by Jennie Peterson, an archaeologist with Bishop Museum, as she was doing an environmental impact study on the once-proposed Deep Draft Harbor, but the history of the sinkholes would be written by local zoologist Dr. Alan Ziegler who spent decades exploring, documenting and teaching others about the wonders to be found out here on the Plain.

Eventually, the Smithsonian got involved with the project and the preeminent avian paleontologists Storrs Olson and Helen James came in to examine the remains.

What they found was astounding. More than 40 extinct species were interned in the sinkholes and of whose existence no one had known until they were discovered here.

There were remains of sea eagles and hawks, flightless rails and finches, and most shocking of all the moa nalo, which in Hawaiian means “lost fowl.” It was a three-foot tall flightless goose-like duck with a head like a tortoise. Many of the remains were in articulated form, as they had most likely died in the sinkhole after having fallen in, giving scientists an unadulterated look into our distant past.

“Back in the day, with all these birds, it must have been quite a raucous place!” says Marjorie Ziegler, daughter of Alan and executive director for the Conservation Council for Hawai‘i who hopes to oversee the care of the preserve one day.

Many of these remains now reside in Washington, D.C. at the Smithsonian and while the important artifacts have been removed, there is still much for future generations to learn at this holdover from pre-human contact Hawai‘i.

For years the CCH and Hawai‘i Nature Center led tours to the sinkholes, allowing children a chance to play archaeologists for a day. Ladders would be set up, many of the holes are 8-feet deep, and the kids would descend into the depths to use trawls, scoop sand and bring buckets of it to the surface.


Here they would use screens to discover the bones of Hawaiian petryls, the ‘ua‘u, that is only found on neighbor islands now and the beaks of long-gone crows who used to call O‘ahu home. They would always return the remains to the sinkhole to allow the next group to discover them.

But in recent years, invasive species of plants have overgrown the property, the holes are obscured by weeds making it difficult to find them or, even worse, hard to see their openings until you are falling into one.

The sea air and vandals have ravaged the fencing; and while still protected on paper, Ziegler is concerned about what could happen to this valuable natural resource.
“I worry less about homeless people setting up camp in there than about the accidental bulldozer collapsing them,” says Ziegler.

The holdup on the turnover of the land to the DLNR is a modern-world one.

The property cannot be conveyed until the surrounding land is subdivided and the subdivision cannot happen until there is improved road access to the surrounding industrial park development. This development, named Kapolei Harborside is planned to happen over the next decade, so while the plan is still to turn the land over to the DLNR, it may be some time before the public gets to visit this important bit of our area’s history.

When this lot at the corner of Malakole and Hanua streets is officially turned over, Ziegler and her team at CCH have big plans for the sinkholes starting with clearing the land of all the invasive species, including many large kiawe trees, and marking the sinks so that the visitors can be safe when visiting.

Next will be to build an educational area where kupuna can talk about these extinct species before kids go visit the sinkholes. And here, Ziegler’s visions can finally be realized, as amongst the remains our ancient past, the minds of our future can grow.

For more on the Conservation Council for Hawai‘i, log on to www.conservehi.org

SINKHOLE BIRDS THAT ARE EXTINCT

Extinct species of birds from sinkholes on the 'Ewa Plain:

Pterodroma jugabilis, a medium-sized petrel
Thambetochen xanion, a large flightless species of waterfowl (moa nalo)
Branta (uncertain species), a weak-flying goose, closely related to the nene
Porzana ziegleri, a small flightless rail
Porzana ralphorum, a large flightless rail
Circus dossenus, a small harrier, apparently adapted to feed on forest birds
Grallistrix geleches, a long-legged, bird-eating owl
Corvus impluviatus, a raven-sized crow with a deep, arched bill
Corvus viriosus, a raven-sized crow with a long, straight bill
Myadestes oahuensis, the O'ahu thrush
Moho apicalis, the O'ahu 'o'o (a honeyeater)
Chaetoptila (related to) angustipluma, a large honeyeater
Telespiza persecutrix, a small finch similar to the Laysan and Nihoa finches
Chloridops wahi, a grosbeak finch similar to the extinct Kona finch of the Big Island.
Chloridops regiskongi, a grosbeak finch with a really large bill, nicknamed King Kong finch.
Rhodacanthis litotes, similar to the extinct koa-finches of the Big Island.
Xestospiza fastigialis, a finch with a conical bill that was once common on O'ahu, Moloka'i and Maui.
Hemignathus upupirostris, an 'akialoa (Hawaiian honeycreeper with a long, thin, decurved bill)
Aidemedia chascax, a Hawaiian honeycreeper with a long, straight bill
Aidemedia zanclops, a Hawaiian honeycreeper with a sickle-shaped bill
Ciridops (uncertain species), a short-billed, strong-legged Hawaiian honeycreeper of a type previously known only from the Big Island.

SINKHOLE BIRDS STILL THRIVING

Sinkhole birds that are not extinct:

Pterodroma sandwichensis, the Hawaiian petrel; not previously known from O'ahu but bones are abundant in the sinkholes, showing that the region once had a major colony.
Haliaeetus (related to) albicilla, the white-tailed sea eagle. These eagles were either resident in the Islands or were regular visitors in the past. (A sea eagle was spotted on Kaua'i and possibly on O'ahu late last year and earlier this year.)
Telespiza cantans, the Laysan finch, known historically only from Laysan Island.
Loxioides bailleui, the Palila, known historically only from high-elevation Big Island mamane-naio forest.

Source: Helen James, Smithsonian Institution

Oahu's Ewa Plain Karst Sinkholes And Caves Yield Extinct Bird Fossils

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2015/01/ewa-plain-karst-sinkholes-and.html

US Fish Wildlife Demonstrates How 

Ewa Plain Karst Can Be Restored

 http://ewa-hawaii-karst.blogspot.com/2014/12/us-fish-wildlife-ewa-preserve.html