A visit to the hospital on Engineering Island

Back during WW II the military built a hospital bunker on Engineering Island. Doug McCauley kept me too busy to try to explore it during my first trip to Palmyra in 2013. In 2014 I tried to visit it, but the US Fish & Wildlife Manager was a new, short term substitute covering for Stefan who had to return to the mainland. Despite our best attempt in Stefan's absence, we were unsuccessful in locating it in the dense tropical forest. Armed with flashlights, Stefan led five of us on a Sunday morning trek across the sand flats and through the forest to see the hospital. In 2016 I met with success.

As you can tell from one of the entrances shown below, the bunker is very overgrown by dense vegetation.

one of several entrances to WW II hospital bunker

There was not too much of interest to see inside. We found rusted metal cabinets and stacks of old rusted mattress springs from the hospital beds. We did run across one coconut crab that had set up residence in the bunker. The thing that surprised me was how large it was. I expected it to be slightly bigger than one of the bunkers found on Cooper Island that is currently used for storage. Instead I found a many room complex with separate wings to the building. With only 13 of us on Palmyra right now, it is hard to imagine the place when it was occupied by more than 2,400 military personnel.

some of the crap left in the abandoned hospital on Engineering Island

Below is a picture of the "vault" door. I wonder what was kept in the vault. The room currently has empty coconut shells in it.

door to the "vault"