Tsunami in Hawaii

There was an 8.8 magnitude earthquake on the coast of Chile on Friday night. This led to tsunami warnings for the entire Pacific basin, Hawaii included. I woke up to the sound of the TV yesterday (Saturday) morning and it was still dark out. Mr A had gotten a text from family on the mainland and turned the news on at 5:35am. And so began my day.

Even though the waves weren't expected in Hilo until 11am, the tsunami sirens began their hourly toll at 6am, waking up the baby. We all lounged on the futon in the living room, transfixed by the news despite the fact there was nothing new to report for five hours. At one point in the morning, we decided that we didn't have a proper disaster kit (meaning we didn't have enough food or water to last the mandatory 5-7 days). Even though we live in elevation and it would take a 2,200 foot wave to affect us, any damage to the ship yards would put a stop to all shipments coming into the island. And I don't think Foodland had enough stock to last us all a week!

So Mr A went out into the pandemonium at 8am. Although he left with instructions to only get emergency rations (ie. canned soup), he came back with four loaves of bread, a bunch of bananas, three bags of potato chips and taro bread pudding from the bakery. Oh yeah, and a gallon of water. HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO LIVE ON THAT FOR 5-7 DAYS?!?!? He officially lost his grocery shopping privileges.

Luckily, the tsunami was a total bust. I was happy it didn't cause widespread inconvenience and that the county took such effective precautionary measures, but I was annoyed that I wasted my whole morning on a false alarm.

I heard later that evening from a tourist who informed me that the ocean was perfect all day and he even took his family swimming during the evacuation. It was hard to not call him an idiot straight to his face. It's truly amazing how little respect people have for nature. FYI: the ocean is not a swimming pool.