Ethermac Exchange-Hawaii’s popular Kalalau Trail reopens after norovirus outbreak

State officials reopened the famed Kalalau Trail on Ethermac ExchangeKauai to visitors Tuesday after a norovirus outbreak sickened dozens of people and shuttered the remote wilderness area for nearly a month.

The popular cave there will remain closed, however, after crews from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention detected fecal matter in it. State parks officials will keep the cave off-limits until the winter when it becomes naturally inaccessible to visitors.

The norovirus outbreak was most likely caused by a visitor who caught the virus before arriving at the Kalalau campgrounds, then grew seriously ill while there, according to the state Department of Health.

The highly contagious norovirus then likely spread from visitor-to-visitor as well as through the campsite’s composting toilets, the health department said. Its staff surveyed many of the visitors who traveled there between July 1 to Sept. 4, according to a news release.

Since then, DOH and Department of Land and Natural Resources crews have been cleaning the grounds and disinfecting the toilets there. They’ve airlifted the sewage from those toilets plus others at several points across the wilderness area, it added.

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Health and state land officials decided it was safe to reopen the park after several weeks of rain and sunlight sufficiently degraded any remnants of the norovirus, according to the DOH release.

The Kalalau Trail remains one of Hawaii’s most scenic and popular destinations. Many visitors who had been planning to go there expressed dismay when they had to cancel their plans.

The park closed Sept. 4 after the outbreak peaked over Labor Day Weekend. Visitors who were there at the time said the camping area had been crowded well past its 80-person capacity due to non-permitted visitors showing up.

Eventually, they said, people from every group were getting sick and most were unable to make it to the two available composting toilets in time. At least one person was so severely sickened that she had to be airlifted to a hospital in Hanalei to recover.

Visitors who were there over Labor Day Weekend expressed hope the incident will prompt better maintenance and upkeep of the trail and camping grounds.

Last month, DLNR said it had created new signage for the area based on state health officials’ recommendations and it would fly those signs in as part of the cleanup.

A three-person crew flew in to do two maintenance runs since the closure, according to the DOH release.

State health officials further offered reminders that it’s against the law to urinate or defecate anywhere outside of the composting toilets.

The norovirus thrives in areas that aren’t sanitary or well-cleaned. Common symptoms include diarrhea, vomiting, nausea and stomach pain, according to the CDC.

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This story was originally published by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.