Farallon Islands
The Farallon Islands, or Farallones, are a group of islands and sea stacks in the Gulf of the Farallones, off the coast of San Francisco, California, United States. The islands are also sometimes referred to by mariners as the Devil's Teeth Islands, in reference to the many treacherous underwater shoals in their vicinity. The islands lie outside the Golden Gate and south of Point Reyes, and are visible from the mainland on clear days. The islands are part of the City and County of San Francisco. The only inhabited portion of the islands is on Southeast Farallon Island, where researchers from Point Blue Conservation Science and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service stay. The islands are closed to the public.
The Farallon Islands National Wildlife Refuge is one of 63 national wildlife refuges that have congressionally designated wilderness status. In 1974, the Farallon Wilderness was established and includes all islands except the Southeast Island for a total of. Additionally, waters surrounding the islands are protected as part of the Greater Farallones National Marine Sanctuary.
History
The peaks of the Farallon Islands are visible from coastal areas of San Francisco and Marin County, so the Native Americans who lived in the San Francisco area were aware of them, and believed them to be an abode of the spirits of the dead. They are not believed to have traveled to the islands.The first Europeans to see these islands were most probably the members of the Juan Cabrillo expedition of 1542, which sailed as far north as Point Reyes, but no source record of the Cabrillo expedition's actual sighting of these islands has survived. The first European to create a record of the islands that has survived was the English privateer and explorer Sir Francis Drake, on July 24, 1579. On that day, Drake landed on the islands to collect seal meat and bird eggs for his ship. He named them the Islands of Saint James because the day after his arrival was the feast day of St James the Great. The name of St James is now applied to only one of the rocky islets of the North Farallons.
The islands were apparently first given their names "Farallones" by Friar Antonio de la Ascencion, aboard the Spanish explorer Sebastián Vizcaíno's 1603 expedition. De la Ascension wrote in his diary, "Six leagues before reaching Punta de los Reyes is a large island, two leagues from land and three leagues northwest of this are... seven farallones close together." It is believed that probably for the next two centuries after Drake first recorded their existence, their rather ominous appearance, lying just off the entrance to San Francisco Bay, most likely caused the earlier mariners to prefer to skirt far to the west and offshore from the entrance to the bay, thus leading to the much later discovery of the San Francisco Bay by land over two centuries after the 1542 discovery of the islands. In 1769, the bay inlet was finally discovered soon after an overland sighting of the bay was made from what is now the Pacifica area.
In the years following the discovery of the islands, during the maritime fur trade era, the islands were exploited by seal hunters, first from New England and later from Russia. The Russians maintained a sealing station in the Farallones from 1812 to 1840, taking 1,200 to 1,500 fur seals annually, though American ships had already exploited the islands. The Albatross, captained by Nathan Winship, and the O'Cain, captained by his brother Jonathan Winship, were the first American ships sent from Boston in 1809 to establish a settlement on the Columbia River. In 1810, they met with two other American ships at the Farallon Islands, the Mercury and the Isabella, and at least 30,000 seal skins were taken. By 1818, the seals diminished rapidly until only about 500 could be taken annually and within the next few years, the fur seal was extirpated from the islands. Whether the northern fur seal or the Guadalupe fur seal were the islands' native fur seal is unknown, although the northern fur seal is the species that began to recolonize the islands in 1996.
On July 17, 1827, French sea captain Auguste Duhaut-Cilly sailed by the southernmost Farallon Island and counted the "crude dwellings of about a hundred Kodiaks stationed there by the Russians of Bodega...the Kodiaks, in their light boats, slip into San Francisco Bay by night, moving along the coast opposite the fort, and once inside this great basin, they station themselves temporarily on some of the inner islands, from where they catch the sea otter without hindrance."
After Alta California was ceded by Mexico to the United States in 1848 with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the islands' environment became linked to the growth of the city of San Francisco. Beginning in 1853, a lighthouse was constructed on SEFI. As the city grew, the seabird colonies came under severe threat as eggs were collected in the millions for San Francisco markets. The trade, which in its heyday could yield 500,000 eggs a month, was the source of conflict between the egg-collecting companies and the lighthouse keepers. This conflict turned violent in a confrontation between rival companies in 1863. The clash between two rival companies, known as the Egg War, left two men dead and marked the end of private companies on the islands, although the lighthouse keepers continued egging.
From 1902 to 1913, the former U.S. Weather Bureau maintained a weather station on the southeast island, which was connected with the mainland by cable. The results of the meteorological study were later published in a book on California's climate. Temperatures during those years never exceeded or dropped to. Years later, the National Weather Service provided some weather observations from the lighthouse on its local radio station.
The islands have also been mentioned in connection with the schooner Malahat as one possible site for Rum Row during Prohibition.
A high-frequency direction finding station was established here by the Navy during World War II. These radio intercept sites along the coast could track Japanese warships and merchant marine vessels as far away as the Western Pacific. The other stations in California were at Point Arguello, Point Saint George, and San Diego. Bainbridge Island, Washington also hosted a station. The United States Coast Guard maintained a staffed lighthouse until 1972, when it was automated.
Nuclear waste dump
From 1946 to 1970, the sea around the Farallones was used as a dump site for radioactive waste under the authority of the Atomic Energy Commission at a site known as the Farallon Island Nuclear Waste Dump. Most of the dumping took place before 1960, and all dumping of radioactive wastes by the United States was terminated in 1970. By then, 47,500 containers had been dumped in the vicinity, with a total estimated radioactive activity of 14,500 Ci. The materials dumped were mostly laboratory materials containing traces of contamination. By 1980, most of the radiation had decayed.Waste containers were shipped to Hunters Point Shipyard, then loaded onto barges for transportation to the Farallones. Containers were weighted with concrete. Those that floated were sometimes shot with rifles to sink them. Forty-four thousand containers were dumped at, and another 3,500 at.
In January 1951, the highly radioactive hull of USS Independence, which was used in Operation Crossroads nuclear weapons testing and then loaded with barrels of radioactive waste, was scuttled in the area. Its wreck was rediscovered in 2015.
The exact current location of the containers and the potential hazard the containers pose to the environment are unknown. According to the EPA, attempts to remove the barrels would likely produce greater risk than leaving them undisturbed.
Shipwrecks
The islands are the site of many shipwrecks. The liberty ship SS Henry Bergh, a converted troop carrier, hit West End in 1944. The USS Conestoga, a US Navy tugboat that disappeared with its 56 crew members in 1921, was found in 2009 and positively identified in 2016.On the morning of August 5, 1941, a United States Coast Guard Douglas Dolphin, V-126, likely struck a rock pinnacle on the southeast Farallon island, causing the aircraft to burst into flames. All 3 crewmen aboard were killed.
Computer scientist Jim Gray was lost at sea after setting out on a solo sailing trip from San Francisco to the Farallones on January 28, 2007. Despite an unusually thorough search, neither his body nor his boat was ever found. On April 14, 2012, the sailing yacht Low Speed Chase capsized during a race at Maintop Island, killing 5 of the 8 crew aboard.
Swimming records
Three people have successfully swam from the Farallones to the Golden Gate, with two more swimming to points north of the gate. The first, Ted Erikson, made the swim in September 1967, with the second, Joseph Locke, swimming to the Golden Gate on July 12, 2014, in 14 hours. The third person, and the first woman to complete the distance, Kimberley Chambers, made it in just over 17 hours on August 7, 2015.On May 11, 2024, Amy Appelhans Gubser became the first and only person to have swum in the outbound direction, from the Golden Gate to SE Farralone, in just over 17 hours.
In August 1967, Luciano "Blackie" Forner of the Point Richmond Water ski club, is the only person known to have water-skied from Pt. Richmond to the ''Farallon Islands,''