As Japan reeled from the shock of a magnitude 8.9 earthquake that triggered horrifically destructive tsunamis there, 20 countries prepared to absorb tsunami impacts on their own coasts. Here in America, coastal national parks in Hawaii, Alaska, Washington, Oregon, and northern California are in the bullseye.

Debris from an enormous trash-laden vortex in the North Pacific is delivered to Hawaiian Archipelago shorelines, making beach cleanups a never-ending task at Kalaupapa National Historical Park.

At South Carolina's Ninety Six National Historic Site, where Americans fought and died in two Revolutionary War battles, the Park Service has been locked in a different sort of struggle. Although critical preservation and interpretation issues must be resolved, the resources available allow for little more than a holding action. It's awfully difficult to serve steak on a mac-and-cheese budget.

The Kemp's ridley may be little as sea turtles go, but it's got big problems. It was already the world's most endangered marine turtle before the mammoth Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico threatened to wreak havoc on its vital habitat.