Preserving Paradise :o)

During the final days of the Bush administration, a group of Pacific islands owned by the Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, was given broad protections as a new marine national monument.



The monument status will limit commercial uses such as fishing and oil drilling.



All told, the new designation protects more than 195,000 square miles of ocean, an area larger than the states of Oregon and Washington combined. The designation protects 13 million acres of water around Palmyra, including the nearby Kingman Reef.