Denise's Hawaii - Day 8-9 Tsunami Watch

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Well that was an interesting two days.


When we got up yesterday we returned the car and walked from the lot to Wailana Coffee House for breakfast. Then we walked back to the hotel, checked out and waited for our airport shuttle.

Shuttle arrived right on time, short trip to the airport and we got there a couple hours early. Decided to grab a drink and a bite at the restaurant in the waiting area. They only offered four drinks and five foods (wings, nachos, and three sandwiches) so we just grabbed a drink each.

The flight from Honolulu over to Kona was quick and uneventful. Unfortunately, Darrin hadn’t been feeling well all week and a cold finally got hold of him that morning. We had tickets to the Kona Brewer’s Festival Dinner at 6pm that night and we’d booked a hotel room down the coast from Kailua-Kona so we didn’t have to drive back to Hilo in the dark. But, Darrin just wasn’t feeling up to a dinner and instead wanted to simply drive to the house and rest for the remainder of the day.

So, we forfeited the room and headed out. Turns out, that was a good decision.

We finally got to the house around 8, then at 9:30 the phone rang. It was the management company calling to let us know there had been an earthquake in Japan and Hawaii was issuing a tsunami watch. She advised we should watch the TV or listen to the radio and follow any instructions.

We watched a channel out of Honolulu, for hours, constantly waiting for that update that would say everything was going to be fine. But each update said the same thing: the waves were expected to hit at 3am and they had the potential to be disastrous.

There is a disaster preparedness section in the front of the phonebook with maps that shows if you are in an inundation area. If you are located in a shaded area, you were in a low-lying or coastal location and needed to evacuate if the orders were given. Sure enough, before 11, there was a knock at the door. We would have to evacuate the area by 2am when the roads would be closed.

The Civil Defense agency had upgraded the watch to a warning and evacuations were being carried out throughout the islands. The tsunami warning sirens went off every hour on the hour, counting up to 3am.

So, we packed up everything we had just unloaded and decided we would wait for the last buoy data to come in from the Midway Islands before setting out. By 1:15 the information still hadn’t been shared from the previous set of buoys the waves had passed through and we decided not to wait… lest we get left behind.

We drove a few miles up the highway to the nearest town of Pahoa. Hilo is the nearest large centre, but considering they don’t have a good history with tsunamis we definitely didn’t want to head there. Hilo is also an inundation area so they were evacuating as well.

Once we go to Pahoa, we couldn’t remember the directions we had been given to the community centre. We drove around a bit, but no luck. We drove around the school, in case the centre was located nearby, but no luck. We finally just found a place to park on the side of the road and left the radio on while trying to catch some zzzzzs.

We slept on and off until about 6am. It’s just not that comfortable sleeping in the front seat of a Jeep! The headrest is in your way, there’s headlights in your eyes, and during the times we had the vehicle running to charge the battery the dash lights were so bright they were blinding! There was no adjustment for them unfortunately.

Around 7 the sun was up, we were awake, and people in the house behind where we had parked were leaving for work, so we thought we’d better get moving. We drove to the realty office but they were closed so we just sat in the lot. We still had the radio on, waiting for any updates saying we could return home, and getting bits of stories about damage that was done.
-Parts of Maui had been flooded
-Two houses were washed away in Kailua-Kona
-Bubba Gump’s and a hotel in Kailua-Kona had been flooded
-waves in some areas were seven feet high
-at one point a wave (island unknown) swept 100 feet inland

It seemed like Hilo had been spared. But, that wasn’t confirmed, so we sat, and sat, and sat. We were in the parking lot of a busy mall, with a gas station 20 feet behind us, but we were so exhausted we kept dozing off. Then, at 7:30 the tsunami warning was downgraded to an advisory. This meant that all the biggest waves had passed through the islands and the only thing left to be concerned about was the after-effects. There were still strong, unpredictable surges, large waves and tidal effects, so beaches were closed for the day, and people were still not allowed to return to evacuated areas.

Finally, at 9am, the evacuation order was lifted. We still didn’t have the all clear, meaning, the water was still off limits, but everyone on the Big Island could return home with the exception of Kona and the coast south of Kona. They had suffered damage that was still being assessed, including roads that had been washed away or destroyed in sections.

We drove home and happed for a few hours, and wondered if the vacation was worth it!

Also, at 11 last night, Kilauea had the biggest earthquake in something like 20 years. Kilauea has earthquakes nearly every day, sometimes several. They are usually in the 2 to 3 range and aren’t always noticed in the populated areas. But at 11pm the night of the Japan earthquake there was a series of larger quakes and one measured at over 4 on the scale and was felt all the way to the coast.

Plus with the fissure eruption last week (which stopped suddenly yesterday afternoon – maybe a relation to the earthquakes Kilauea had??) there were air quality issues as ash was released for some time.

But, it all makes for really interesting stories when we get home!!