General · EdgepediaSeptember 17, 20268 min read

National Park of American Samoa

The National Park of American Samoa is a United States national park on the islands of Tutuila, Ta'ū, and Ofu in the Territory of American Samoa, in the South Pacific Ocean, and it is the only National Park Service site south of the Equator.¹ Congress established it on October 31, 1988 under Public Law 100-571, and it preserves paleotropical rainforest, Indo-Pacific coral reefs, flying fox habitat, and the archeological and cultural resources of a Samoan culture about 3,000 years old.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Established	October 31, 1988 (Public Law 100-571); 50-year village lease signed in 1993; Olosega expansion approved in 2002¹
Size	13,500 acres total: 9,500 land acres and 4,000 marine acres, mostly coral reef¹
Islands	Units on three tropical islands, Tutuila, Ta'ū, and Ofu, about 2,600 miles southwest of Hawai'i¹^•³
Land tenure	No federally owned land; parkland and water are leased from Samoan villages for 50 years⁴
Biodiversity	About 950 reef fish and 250 coral species; 35 native bird species; three bat species, including fruit bats with 3-foot wingspans¹
Climate	Warm and humid year-round, high 70s to low 90s °F; 125 inches of rain annually in drier areas, up to 300 inches on the highest mountains⁵
Visitation	43,258 recreation visits in 2025, the 58th most-visited of 63 national parks⁶^•⁷
Fees	No entrance fees³

Establishment and the village lease

Congress authorized the park in 1988, but the enabling law required a different path to the land than in any other park. Because traditional Samoan land is communally owned by extended families (aiga) under the authority of chiefs (matai) and cannot be sold outside the family, the federal government could not simply purchase the area.¹^•⁸ The Secretary of the Interior was directed to negotiate a lease with the Governor of American Samoa, and the park could be established only once that 50-year lease was signed.⁹

The 1993 lease. The agreement was signed on September 10, 1993, after roughly five years of negotiation, with eight participating villages.¹^•⁸ Under it, the National Park Service pays rent to the village families while villagers retain rights to use selected natural resources, including subsistence farming and fishing, subject to some restrictions such as limits on clearing forest for taro planting.⁸ The park is therefore managed jointly with village leaders, and Congress approved an expansion onto neighboring Olosega Island in 2002 that added two more villages.⁴^•¹ Feasibility work stretched back decades: the National Park Service produced a park program study for American Samoa in 1965 and a joint feasibility study with the territorial government in 1988.⁴

Islands and landscape

The park's 13,500 acres are spread across units on three volcanic islands, the peaks of ancient underwater volcanoes.¹^•² On Tutuila, the largest and most populous island, the park covers the north-central part of the island from the ridgeline above Pago Pago Harbor to the north coast, and the sheer cliffs of Pola Island serve as nesting habitat for seabirds such as frigatebirds, boobies, white terns, tropicbirds, and brown noddies.¹⁰ The Manu'a Islands of Ta'ū, Ofu, and Olosega lie about 60 miles east.¹⁰

On Ta'ū, the park includes the southeastern half of the island, where sea cliffs stair-step up to the 3,170-foot (966 m) summit of Lata Mountain, the highest point in American Samoa.¹⁰ The sacred site of Saua on Ta'ū's southeast coast is considered by many Samoans the birthplace of Polynesian culture.² Ofu's parkland along the southeast coast features sand beaches and a fringing coral reef, and a bridge links Ofu to rainforest-cloaked Olosega.¹⁰ About 4,000 acres of the park lie offshore underwater.³

Ecosystems and wildlife

Rainforest. Almost all the park's land area, from mountaintops to the coast, is mixed-species paleotropical rainforest, meaning Old World forest related to the floras of Asia and Africa rather than the neotropical forests of the Americas; no single tree species dominates.¹⁰ The park holds the only paleotropical rainforest ecosystem in the U.S. national park system, with more than 475 plant species, about 30 percent of the archipelago's plant species endemic, and two species of native fruit bats (pe'a) that pollinate plants and disperse seeds.²^•¹ Bats are the islands' only native mammals: two flying fox species and one insect-eating species, with wingspans close to three feet in the fruit bats.¹⁰

Coral reefs. The park is one of four national park units in the Pacific Islands containing a coral reef ecosystem, sheltering more than 230 coral species and over 900 fish species; other NPS accounts give the figures as over 975 fish species and more than 250 coral species.²^•¹¹^•²⁰ Rare and endangered sea turtles and humpback whales occur in the marine system, and more than a hundred nearshore species are harvested for food, since subsistence fishing is allowed within the park.¹

Ofu's heat-tolerant corals. The back-reef tide pools of Ofu Lagoon have become a natural laboratory for coral climate research. Two adjacent pools about 500 meters apart differ sharply in temperature: the highly variable pool ranges from 24.5 to 35 °C, briefly exceeding the local critical bleaching temperature of 30 °C during strong noontime low tides, while the moderately variable pool stays between 25 and 32 °C.¹²^•¹³ Corals native to the hotter, more variable pool show consistently higher bleaching resistance, and common-garden experiments on the massive coral Porites lobata indicate fixed adaptive differences rather than mere acclimation.¹²^•¹⁴ This apparent resistance to warming waters and changing pH makes the park's reefs a focus of research on the future of coral reefs worldwide.²

Resource condition and threats

A 2019 Natural Resource Condition Assessment, prepared with the University of Vermont, evaluated eleven resource categories. Five terrestrial resources were in good condition (rainforests, cloud forests, forest birds, fruit bats, and streams), seabirds were of moderate conservation concern, and air quality was not evaluated for lack of data; overall, terrestrial resources scored better than marine ones, and data gaps existed for nearly all categories.¹⁵ Invasive species and climate change were the two recurring threats.¹⁵ Specific pressures include invasive plants such as Koster's curse (Clidemia hirta) and mile-a-minute vine, which spread when cyclones or human activity disturb the canopy; the invasive tree Tamaligi palagi (Falcataria moluccana), controlled through a park and village partnership; rising ocean temperatures threatening the reefs; and growing human population pressure around the Tutuila unit.¹⁶

Visiting

The park is one of the most remote units of the National Park System, reached by flights into Pago Pago International Airport on Tutuila, with smaller flights onward to Ta'ū and Ofu.³ There are no entrance fees, and the park lacks the facilities typical of most U.S. national parks; camping is prohibited.³^•¹⁰ The visitor center in Pago Pago is open weekdays from 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and current visitation levels support weekday operations only.³^•¹⁷ Park roads and trails are open 24 hours a day, but the Old Vatia and Tuafanua trails close on Sundays at the request of the families on whose land they cross, since Sunday is a day of rest and religious observance in Samoan culture.¹⁷

Because the park sits within Samoan villages, visitors are asked to observe fa'asamoa, the Samoan way of life: ask permission before entering village areas or taking photographs, dress modestly, and stop quietly during the evening prayer time called Sā.³^•¹⁸ Popular activities include the Mount 'Alava Trail on Tutuila, rainforest hiking on Ta'ū, and snorkeling Ofu's reefs, for which visitors should bring their own gear.³

Visitation trends. Annual recreation visits have swung widely with travel conditions: 69,468 in 2017 and 60,006 in 2019 collapsed to 4,819 in 2020 and 1,887 in 2022 during the COVID-19 period, then recovered to 43,258 by 2025.⁶ Even at that level the park ranked 58th of 63 national parks in 2025, and visitor spending that year supported an estimated 13 jobs in the local economy.⁷^•¹⁹

References

Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 21, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 21, 2026