Alakai Swamp Telephone Poles

You’re slogging through the Alakai Swamp in Kauai, the world’s highest swamp, and you look up and see a telephone pole out in the middle of nowhere. Then along the way you notice several more. You figure there’s a story behind the poles. Perhaps they were part of the project to build a road across northern Kauai, the remnants which became the Pihea Trail. But the story behind the Alakai Swamp Telephone poles is actually much more interesting. The poles are actually from a top secret World War 2 Army Signal Corps project in late 1943 to provide an alternative communications link for the U.S. Military radar station at Koke’e in case of Japanese attack at the airfield.

The arduous job of constructing the link fell to Robert Oelrich, a member of the 443 Signal Construction and Aviation Battalion, a unit of the 7th Army Air Force Bomber unit. Oelrich, a former telephone man, was provided 5,000 wood stakes to mark the path, hundreds of poles, miles of telephone cable, 30 mules and the approximately 50 men of Company B.

Many people thought it was an impossible task, but Oelrich was convinced it could be done. The unit moved into the nearby Kokee Civilian Conservation Corps (C.C.C.) camp. Oelrich negotiated with local Japanese farmers for vegetables to supplement the K-Rations to make sure his men had the extra fuel needed to work in the extreme environment. A road, that still exists today, was built to the swamp. The swamp was not the best place to plant poles and work was slow-going. A steady convoy of heavily-laden mules transported equipment until the bogs became too deep. The men had to carry 65-pound bundles of wire and drag the remaining telephone poles for the last segment.

While the work was ongoing in the Alakai Swamp, another group was working from the Haena side. A company of men, stationed at Camp Naue, worked their way up the Wainiha Valley. The two sides linked up when Oelrich and his men dropped wire almost straight down from Kilohana, now the famous lookout at the end of the Alakai Swamp Trail.

Today, just a few poles remain. The poles that are no longer there were not lost due to rot, but were cut down by collectors seeking the glass insulators.

Google Maps: Alakai Swamp Trail