Could Overtourism Be Taking a Toll on Hawaii’s Molokini Island?

It’s picture-perfect. But Hawaii’s Molokini Crater may, in fact, be too perfect.

When photographers and videographers choose places to shoot snorkeling videos and idyllic magazine spreads for travel and tourism, this is where they choose. Now, some researchers say it might be overused.

Molokini Island, off the coast of Maui in Hawaii, has long been considered one of the most picturesque spots in the world, and a premier place for snorkeling.

According to USA Today, however, the spot is overused and might be in need of additional management to help oversee all the tourists.

“The COVID-related tourism freeze provided a unique natural experiment to measure the effects of decreased tourism on fish behavior in a high-use, no-take marine protected area,” said Kevin Weng of William & Mary’s Virginia Institute of Marine Science and lead author of a new studt on the area in a statement.

Molokini still isn’t necessarily teeming with people, but it is teaming with picturesque wildlife that is in danger of having its fragile ecosystem upset.

More than two-thirds of the people surveyed in 2011, for a research study, said the island already felt overcrowded.