Hawaii Tsunami

With all the tragic events in Japan, it seems almost in poor taste to talk about our Hawaii experience, as insignificant as it was. However, many have asked what happened to us over there, so I'll give a short account. We were in our hotel room, which was actually on the beach, watching the news on Thursday night. It was so awful to watch what was happening in Japan but then it hit closer to home as Hawaii was put on Tsunami-warning. It was suppose to hit about 3am, Hawaii time. The hotel said we should be ok if we stayed above the fifth floor, but they might have to evacuate us at the last minute to the town ballpark. We decided that didn't sound very encouraging, so we drove to the wardhouse (up on a hill) with the intention of spending the night in the car. We'd only been there about an hour before the lights went on, the doors opened and lots of people started arriving to spend the night. The missionaries were there trying to make everyone comfortable. People were sleeping in classrooms, on couches, in the pews, etc. We went in to use the bathroom, get a drink and listen to the reports, but then slept most of the night in our car. Kauai has a great alarm system...sirens went off every hour, so no one slept through the warnings. The tsunami that hit Kauai was only 8 feet, but that was high enough to cause a lot of flooding and quite a bit of damage in the harbors. (A tsunami doesn't just create a big wave...the ocean floor actually rises ... in Kauai's case 8 feet ... and then the whole wall of water comes ashore.) Maui was hit much harder. The roads opened back up around 8am and we headed back to the hotel. So, while we really weren't in any danger, it will definitely be a trip we'll always remember.