Water emergency
hits northwest Kauai

Drought on the west side has
caused the Kokee area's well to run dry

By Anthony Sommer
Kauai correspondent

KOKEE, Kauai -- State officials have cut off water service to more than half of the 100 rental cottages in Kokee State Park and to the Navy's missile tracking station on nearby Makaha Ridge.

The continuing drought on the west side of Kauai caused the only well serving the Kokee area to run dry, and its pump burned out last week, Clyde Hosokawa of the state Parks Division said yesterday.

The pump has been replaced but is only producing about half the previous output.

"It's pumping about 10,000 gallons a day, but the demand is 20,000 gallons," Hosokawa said.

A new, deeper well was drilled three years ago but has not been used because it lacks a pump. It may be several months until it can be brought on line and the water approved by the state Health Department for drinking, he said.

Tourist facilities at the Kokee Lodge and Kokee Museum were without water last weekend, and the state has brought portable toilets into the area. About 60 cabins in the Puu Ka Pele area of the park also are without water.

Hardest hit has been the Navy's tracking station atop Makaha Ridge, which used about two-thirds of the water from the well.

About 20 technicians operating radar and telemetry equipment at the facility are drinking bottled water and have been told to ration other water use, said Vida Mossman, spokeswoman for the Pacific Missile Range Facility.

A Navy truck has been hauling 2,000 gallons of water a day up to Makaha Ridge since late last week, she said.

Large areas of state park land have been closed in the Kokee and Waimea Canyon areas since June because of the drought and high fire danger. Although most of Kauai had abundant rainfall this summer, the northwest corner of the island has received little of it.

The Kokee well had been dwindling in output for several years.

"This summer's drought finally did it in," Hosokawa said.