Category Archives: Weather

Kawaihae breakwater breach

Some recent high surf made a breach in the breakwater of the northern small boat harbor at Kawaihae. Besides punching this hole in the rock barrier, the wooden mooring floats were also badly damaged and boats using the harbor were ordered to relocate since it was no longer safe.

Repairing the damage being estimated to cost around $8 million. Usually these kinds of thing overrun the estimates by a generous margin.

The top photo shows the extent of the damage as a tug and barge approach the harbor. Below, the picnic tables are deserted as the wind whips up whitecaps and a blast of sand across the area.

Incidentally, the tug and barge were unable to get into harbor because of the strong crosswinds and spent the night out at sea. They were still there next morning when I saw them, but were able to finally get into the harbor a few hours later.

SV Kwai in harbor

I saw this interesting-looking vessel tied up alongside the wharf at Kawaihae harbor for a week or more in the first half of January. When I searched for information about the boat, I learned that it’s the Sailing Vessel Kwai, a cargo vessel operating between Hawaii and Kiribati and the Cook Islands in the Pacific.

I’m not sure what it was doing in Kawaihae. The boat had been in Honolulu earlier in the month, on completion of its 51st voyage. Their 52nd voyage left Honolulu on January 24. Perhaps they were picking up cargo or doing maintenance in between these dates.

According to the first blog from Voyage 52 (here), the boat returned to the west side of the Big Island to search for a ghost net. A ghost net is a large clump of fishing nets that can be very destructive to ocean life and that will eventually wash up on shore somewhere being equally problematic when it does so. This net was estimated to be 50 feet long and deep by 70 feet wide.

A tracker had been attached to the ghost net so that it could be retrieved by a larger boat but, according to the blog post, when SV Kwai reached the area, only the tracker was found and retrieved. I haven’t heard or seen anything else about the net, so it is either still floating in the ocean or has washed up somewhere.

For more information about Sailing Vessel Kwai, go to svkwai.com. For more information about the ghost net, go here.

Shadow makers

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Shadows.’ See more offerings here.

The top photo is a row of colorful playground swings at Kamehameha Park in Kapaau. Below are three cyclists in line, heading out of Hawi during an Ironman World Championship race.

Also posted as a second offering for this week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme of ‘All in a Row.’ (See more responses here.) My first post for this theme is here.

Pueo flying under gray skies

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme is ‘Gray.’ See more offerings here.

This photo shows a pueo, the native Hawaiian short-eared owl, gliding over a gray road beneath a gray sky. This is a stretch of Old Saddle Road, which is one of the best places to see pueos as they hunt in the pastures on either side of the road or rest on fence posts alongside the road.

Early morning

Earlier this month, I got up in the wee hours to view the Quadrantids meteor shower, with the idea of taking photos. My camera isn’t the greatest for this, but in the event, it didn’t matter. I caught a peripheral glimpse of one meteor and that was it.

Still, the effort wasn’t without its rewards. The sky was clear and starry, and I liked this scene of the illuminated building, the large kiawe tree, and the dark, starlit sky.

This is my third post on this week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme of ‘Yin-Yang.’ See more responses here.

Snow on Mauna Kea

This past week or so has been a bit bleak weather-wise. At one point we had a high wind warning, winter storm warning, flash flood warning, and a high surf warning. The warnings were justified. Winds blew at 40 to 50 knots with higher gusts. Rain bucketed down. Surf pounded the shorelines. It was an unfortunate week to be vacationing here.

Meanwhile, up on Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa, the winter storm warning produced a decent snowfall giving those peaks a Christmassy look, albeit a few weeks too late.

Better Days: Swamped boat

Yesterday, in certain parts of the island, the wind was honking. 20 miles south, there was a fresh breeze, but up around Kawaihae it blew a steady 40 knots with many higher gusts. Walking into the wind I had to lean forward at the kind of jaunty angle that would have seen me fall on my face on a calm day.

In the late afternoon, I made my way to Kawaihae harbor to see the waves and get a free skin treatment in the form of sandblasting. The very sheltered harbor was roiled with whitecaps from the whipping offshore wind. Most of the boats were bouncing up and down on the choppy waves, but I noticed something amiss. One of the boats wasn’t bouncing because it was mostly underwater. The outboard engine was the most prominent part to be seen.

I suspect that when the wind drops, the boat will still be barely afloat. But it should be able to be salvaged, pumped out, and ready to go again in fairly short order, so long as it doesn’t get taken out on a day like yesterday.