11:14 a.m.
8 Minutes to Wave Arrival Time
B
rad, Teresa, the boy, and Kai tore down to the beach as fast as they could. The sun neared its apex, and the bright blue sky
and perfect temperature posed an odd juxtaposition to the panic Kai felt. The path was littered with objects people had tossed
aside as they made their mad dash to escape. Beach towels, various types of clothing, sunglasses, a volleyball, pool chairs—
the kinds of items that would normally signal a fine day of vacation were now useless, even a hindrance. “What’s your name?”
Kai asked the boy between breaths.
“Jake.”
“Thanks, Jake. Thanks for coming.”
“No problem.”
“I’m Kai, Lani’s dad.”
They huffed to a stop in front of four Jet Skis that rested on the beach undisturbed. Because all the beaches in
Hawaii were public, the Grand Hawaiian couldn’t build an outbuilding or pier on its property, so they rolled the Jet Skis
down to the beach every morning on trailers and left them there all day to be used by the guests. The Jet Skis would typically
be watched over by someone from the hotel, but now the beach was nearly deserted.
Three of the four in front of Kai were the smaller, two-person variety, the other a larger, three-person craft. The staff
had left in such a hurry that they hadn’t bothered to get the trailers to move all of them back to the hotel—just as Kai
had hoped.
“Where are the girls?” he said to Jake.
Jake pointed toward Diamond Head. “That way. I came ashore near the Marriott.”
“Can you see them?” Kai said.
“I think so,” said Brad, his hand shielding his eyes from the sun.
“Do you know how to ride one of these?” Kai said to Teresa. He didn’t have to ask Brad, who Kai knew had one of his own sitting
in his garage.
“No,” she said. “I’ve never ridden one before.”
“I do,” said Jake. “I know how to ride one.”
When Kai had said that he wanted Jake to show them where the girls were, he only intended for Jake to point them out. Then
Kai was going to send the boy back to the relative safety of the hotel.
“No,” Kai said. “I don’t want you out there. It’s too dangerous.”
“Kai, we need him,” Brad said. “We don’t have time to teach Teresa how to drive one of these things. And if she comes with
you or me, we won’t have room for everyone.”
“And I
am
coming,” Teresa said, her eyes fierce with determination.
Kai wanted to argue, but they had no time.
“You sure?” Kai said to Jake.
“Yeah. My dad takes us on them every summer.”
“Okay, you take that one,” Kai said, pointing to one of the small ones. He jumped on the three-person Jet Ski, and Teresa
got on the back with him. Brad pushed a third out into the water.
When they got them afloat, Brad was the first to notice a potentially fatal problem.
“Holy crap, Kai!” he said. “None of these Jet Skis have keys!”
In their haste, they had forgotten to check whether the keys were still in the ignition. Normally, the keys would stay with
the Jet Skis all day because they were always attended by the hotel staff. But some enterprising employee had decided to take
the keys in case someone tried to go joyriding during the evacuation.
“Dammit!” Kai said. “Stay here. I’ll get them.”
He jumped off and splashed up to the beach in a mad
scramble to find the recreational shack where the keys would be kept. But as he raced from the water, Kai heard a yell from
the direction of the hotel.
“Kai! I’ve got them!”
Rachel ran toward him, waving a handful of keys.
“I remembered that I told Craig to take the keys when he said he didn’t have time to get the Jet Skis back to storage. I brought
them all.” She thrust one into Kai’s hand and threw two more to Brad and Jake. The key was labeled with the number on the
Jet Ski.
“You’re amazing,” Kai said.
“Just get our daughter.” She put a hand on his cheek, and then sprinted back to the hotel.
They fired up the Jet Skis and roared off at top speed.
The few people remaining on the beach ran in different directions, but the masses had by this time left. Some small groups
and individuals stood on the shore, looking out to sea. Many others had gathered on balconies to watch the wave come in. Kai
noted with distress that most of them were no higher than the fourth floor.
“Idiots!” he said under his breath. There was nothing he could do for them now.
They soon reached the group that Kai thought Brad had been pointing to. It turned out to be four surfers paddling idly, chatting
among themselves. Kai slowed, and Brad and Jake followed suit.
“You guys need to get to shore right now!” Kai shouted at the surfers. “There’s a tsunami coming.”
“We know,” one of the surfers shot back. “Just like last year!”
The other surfers laughed at that. Kai looked at his watch, then at Brad, and shook his head.
“Let’s go,” he said.
Leaving them went against Kai’s urge to save everyone he could, but there simply wasn’t time. His first responsibility was
to save his family.
As they throttled back up to full speed, Brad called out, “You morons are going to die!” The surfers just laughed again.
A minute later they passed another small group of surfers, and this time Kai didn’t even slow down. He didn’t have time to
convince people who didn’t want to be convinced.
Before they had gone another two hundred yards, Jake shouted, “There’s Tom!”
Up ahead, Kai could make out two bright yellow kayaks. They were still three hundred yards from shore.
The kayakers heard the noise from the Jet Skis and turned. Kai and the others all started waving at them. At first they didn’t
recognize Kai, but as they got closer, Kai heard Lani shout:
“Daddy!”
With that one word, Kai knew how desperate Lani felt. She never called him Daddy anymore.
They slowed so that their wakes wouldn’t swamp the kayaks. By this time they could see Mia’s head bobbing above an orange
life vest behind the boy’s kayak.
“Oh my God!” Teresa said. “Get Mia!”
Kai pulled his Jet Ski up to the stern of Tom’s kayak.
“Brad, get Lani,” he said. He untied Mia from the nylon rope, and Teresa grabbed one arm while Kai pulled on the other. They
lifted her onto the Jet Ski and placed her between them. Teresa hugged her tightly.
“I’m so glad I found you. Are you okay?”
In response, Mia threw up over the side of the Jet Ski, but all that came up was salt water. Apart from her pallor and exhaustion,
she seemed all right. She wiped her mouth and swiveled in the seat to hug her mother.
“Mom!” she said, weeping uncontrollably. “You’re here.”
“You’re safe now, honey. I won’t let anything happen to you.” Kai knew that Teresa’s response was reflexive, but her promise
was empty. They were all in grave danger.
Brad pulled Lani onto his Jet Ski, and Tom climbed on with Jake. Brad circled around to them, and Kai held out his hand to
Lani, who grabbed it and held it like a vise.
“Are you all right?” he said.
Lani sobbed with relief and nodded.
Kai checked his watch; they had less than three minutes left.
“Let’s go!” Kai yelled to everyone. “Hold on, guys!”
He goosed the throttle, and Brad and Jake did the same.
“Where are we going?” Brad asked over the roar of the Jet Skis.
Kai pointed at a new twenty-story hotel next to Kapi‘olani Park. It was only a block from the beach, right behind a condo
building half its height. As long as it didn’t collapse, the shorter building might provide a buffer against the tsunami.
“But the third wave …!” Brad yelled.
“I know!” Kai yelled back.
They had no confirmation a third wave was coming, but their calculations made one likely. If the first wave was really eighty
feet high, they would be able to survive as long as the building remained standing. It wouldn’t hold up against a two-hundred-foot
wave, but Kai was worried that they weren’t going to make it to the hotel as it was, and he didn’t want to take the chance
that they would be caught on the ground when the wave came in. At ground level, even a twenty-foot wave would be deadly.
They were making good progress, coming in just south of the Kuhio Beach breakwater, when Kai’s Jet Ski inexplicably started
to slow down. He already had the throttle pushed to the limit, but they were still losing speed. He
thought he had a mechanical failure, but the other Jet Skis seemed to be slowing as well.
“Something’s wrong with my ride!” said Jake.
“Mine too,” said Brad.
Kai looked at Waikiki and realized that they weren’t slowing down. Their speed in relation to the beach was indeed slowing,
but it wasn’t because their Jet Skis were decelerating. It was because the water was receding, and they were struggling to
maintain forward motion. The tide was ebbing, the classic trough preceding the wave.
The tsunami had arrived.
11:22 a.m.
First Wave
T
he express elevator to the penthouse restaurant in the Grand Hawaiian opened to dispense the last of the guests from the lobby,
Rachel among them. According to the list in front of her, seven rooms below the tenth floor still had guests in them, but
it was too late to do anything about that now. They were on their own. The Starlight restaurant had a panoramic view of Honolulu,
with glass in every direction except toward the north. To the west was the other Grand Hawaiian building—the Akamai tower—and
downtown Honolulu. To the east was Diamond Head. And to the south, a magnificent view of the Pacific Ocean out to the horizon.
The stunning vistas, not to mention the world-class cuisine, made the Starlight one of the most sought-after reservations
in Honolulu. Celebrities visiting Oahu would often stop there to nosh on crab
Rangoon or shallot-infused mahi mahi and take in the spectacular scenery.
Rachel paid no attention to the view. She walked around the restaurant, trying to calm the guests and answering questions.
“When can we leave?”
“Is someone coming for us?”
“Are we safe up here?”
Rachel tried to be as positive as she could without promising anything.
“Please calm down, everyone,” she said. “We’re perfectly safe up here for now.”
A few of the women cried, but most of the guests took the situation well. The battle-hardened veterans in particular seemed
to be taking it in stride.
A woman at the window screamed, and a man on crutches next to her pointed outside. All heads turned in the direction of the
beach.
Max, who was also standing at the window, waved her over.
“Rachel, come here quick!”
She ran over and gasped when she saw what they were looking at. The water had receded from the beach, exposing a great swath
of sand for miles up and down the coast. The yachts that remained in the Ala Wai marina rested on the bare seafloor, most
of them leaning
over on their sides. The Ala Wai Canal, which extended from the marina under three bridges and angled behind Waikiki, had
been completely drained, revealing its silty brown bed. A few of the sightseers that were left leaned over the bridges’ railings
to watch the fish flopping around in the empty canal. Some of the bystanders finally understood that the coming tsunami was
real and ran across the bridges, seeking refuge they could no longer reach.
Several boats that had left the marina late were now stranded on ocean floor that hadn’t been exposed to the air since before
the first Polynesians had settled in Hawaii. In all, five sailboats, seven motorboats, a 150-foot white luxury yacht, and
a massive dredging barge were left high and dry. Some of the passengers stood dumbfounded on the decks of the boats, while
others jumped overboard in an attempt to get to high ground.
To the east, only a scattered few stayed on the beach, either not realizing the danger or ignoring it. As she surveyed the
scene, she spotted three minuscule objects racing for the shore.
“Kai!” she cried out.
“What?” said Max.
“My husband and daughter. That’s them right there.”
“You’re kidding!”
The Jet Skis were just about to reach the waterline. But
that would leave them still a hundred yards from the nearest building.
“Oh my God!” said Max. “They’re not going to make it. Look!”
“Don’t say that!” Rachel said, clasping his arm. “They
will
make it!”
With the water still flowing out, an even more ominous sign approached. The sun reflected off a line of water stretching from
horizon to horizon. The line seemed to be coming toward them at an impossible speed, but just as it began to slow, it started
to grow in height.
Rachel put her other hand on the window and leaned her head against it.
“Come on, Kai!” she said, pleading, her eyes wide with terror. “You can do it!”
She clutched Max’s arm and could do nothing more than watch as the tsunami loomed in the distance, no more than a minute from
engulfing the tiny specks below.
“Hold on!” Kai yelled.
The Jet Ski hit the exposed beach more gently than he thought it would, sliding along the wet sand easily for at least fifteen
feet. By the time they had all jumped off, the water was already another forty feet behind them, as if a giant vacuum were
sucking the ocean away.
Kai grabbed Lani’s hand and, with the dry bag flapping
uncomfortably against his back, sprinted for the hotel in front of them. The distance seemed vaster than the Sahara Desert,
but he knew they could cross that span in less than a minute. It was all they had.
Brad held Mia’s hand and pulled her along, followed by Teresa, Tom, and Jake. The going was slower than Kai wanted, because
the sand was wet and their feet sank into it all too easily. To make matters worse, the shore inclined significantly, so they
felt as if they were practically climbing it.
Twice, Lani slipped and fell. Kai looked down and saw the reason: she and Mia were wearing flip-flops, while the rest of them
wore sneakers except for Brad, who had on boots.
“Kick those flip-flops off!” Kai said.
The girls did as they were told without hesitation.
In a few more seconds they reached what was normally the surfline. To Kai’s astonishment, a massive Hawaiian woman dressed
in a flowing muumuu walked slowly out toward the ocean, her arms outstretched.
He stopped, mesmerized by the sight.
“Hey!” he yelled. “Ma’am! A tsunami is coming!”
She turned to him. She was in her fifties, her skin wrinkled from exposure to the sun, a beatific smile revealing stunning
white teeth.
“This is God’s will,” she calmly said, and then continued her march to the sea and certain death.
“Come on!” Brad screamed. “Forget her!”
Before Kai turned to run, he stole a look at the sea and with his own eyes saw the phenomenon he had studied for years in
cramped offices with abstract mathematical formulas.
A frothy white mass churned toward them in horrifying splendor, building and collapsing as it reached the shallows surrounding
the island. At first the sound was very much like the crashing of waves on the shore, but the difference was that the roar
never abated: it just kept growing, continually topping itself, reminding Kai of a jet engine throttling up for takeoff.
He might have stayed there, transfixed, until the tsunami took him if Brad hadn’t grabbed his shoulder.
“Come on!” he repeated.
The others were already ahead of Kai, but Lani lagged behind. He grabbed her hand as he ran by.
The girls were exhausted from their ordeal in the kayaks, and they slowed the group down. Mia sobbed from the fatigue, but
she didn’t complain, and neither did Lani.
“You’re doing great!” Kai yelled in encouragement.
They reached Kalakaua Avenue, the sound of the tsunami behind them so loud that it was hard to hear each other. Tom and Jake
started sprinting for the building directly in front of them, and Teresa followed with Mia.
They were headed for the wrong building. The twenty-story hotel Kai had intended to go to was a hundred yards farther up the
street. The condo in front of them was only ten stories high.
“No!” he yelled. “That one!” He pointed at the taller hotel.
The boys either didn’t hear or ignored him.
He followed to try to keep them from going into the smaller building. Although it looked strong, with a solid concrete base,
it was too short to be a refuge from more than the first wave. The wave now towered high above Waikiki Bay, casting a shadow
even though it was midday. To the southeast, the point of Diamond Head was struck by the tsunami. Geysers of water plumed
into the air as it plunged against the steep sides of the extinct volcano, where million-dollar homes were now being pummeled
into splinters by one of the most powerful forces in nature.
The boys had too much of a head start, and Kai didn’t get to them until he reached the front of the building. Brad grabbed
them before they ran in.
“This is the wrong building!” he yelled.
Brad started to run with the boys away from the condo and toward the hotel, but Kai shouted for them to stop. They had run
out of time. If they ran for the hotel, they weren’t going to make it. The boys got to the corner of the
condo building before they turned and headed back toward Kai, who was now at the condo entrance.
He threw open the doors etched with the name “The Seaside” and frantically searched for the stairs. The unfashionable decor
and peeling paint revealed the Seaside’s age, but the building also looked sturdy, and that’s all Kai cared about at the moment.
Teresa shouted, “There!” and wrenched Lani toward a staircase on the east side of the building. Kai followed, with Mia in
tow.
The emergency stairwell was obviously built before new building codes required stairs to be protected within the interior
of the building. These stairs were airy and bright and actually more attractive than the lobby because they were completely
encased in glass.
To his right, Kai could see the tsunami crash with a mammoth splash onto Waikiki Beach. The wave reached the shore to the
southeast first, smashing everything in its path. Instead of a vertical wall of water, the ocean rose like the world’s fastest-rising
tide. At first the palm trees resisted, but the water was too powerful and bent them over like toothpicks. A five-story hotel
farther down the beach was hit and the wave poured through it. Ranch-style homes near it were covered within seconds. Closer
to Kai, surfboards bounced above the churning foam, their owners nowhere to be seen. The Jet Skis flipped over and
disappeared. Then the woman in the muumuu was engulfed by the wave.
The sight made Kai gasp in terror. He raced up the stairs as fast as he could.
Before he reached the second floor, Kai could tell that Mia was completely spent. He grabbed her and held her in his arms
like a toddler, sprinting up the stairs two at a time, the adrenaline kicking his energy to a level he had never before experienced.
In any other circumstance, carrying an extra ninety pounds would have slowed him to a crawl, but with the wave about to crash
down on them, Mia seemed to weigh no more than a sack of groceries.
Kai kept Teresa and Lani in front of him, willing them to go faster. The door on the first floor banged open. He knew it had
to be Brad and the boys, but he didn’t take even a second to glance down at them. They had to get much higher.
He was on the eighth-floor landing when Kai heard a chilling sound. Over the roar of the water, the noise of glass shattering
on the first floor signaled that their time was up. In quick succession, the wave blew out the windows on one floor after
another, like a sharpshooter at a rifle range systematically shooting bottles on a fence.
The building lurched, throwing Kai off balance as he stepped onto the ninth-floor landing, and he slammed against the railing,
almost dumping Mia over the side. He
regained his footing and made it up the last flight of stairs to the top floor. He set Mia on her feet and looked down.
Brad pushed Jake and Tom in front of him at the sixth floor, the churning mass of water now only two floors below him and
rising fast.
They all yelled at Brad from their perch. “Hurry! Come on!”
Kai held the railing in a death grip, hoping that their luck wouldn’t give out now. All he could do was watch as the tsunami
stalked his brother from below.