My mooring/slip at Honokohau here in Kona has problems with large surge in the harbor normally associated with high wave conditions. Decided to go to sea to wait out the possible Tsunami as did most of the boats in the Harbor. Left the Harbor at 0130 but had to power around for the rest of the night as I'd taken down the furling/headstay to work on it and had only the jib halyard as a forestay. Tsunami was reported to have hit the Big Island at approximately 0340 though none of us at sea had any indications of the event. Tried to go back in the harbor at 0700 but was met by extremely disturbed water with a big whirlpool just inside the entrance. A charter fishing boat, going out, as I tried to go in, told me there was very bad surge and not to try and get back in my slip at that time. Did a 'U' and hung out back in the ocean. Monitored the VHF but continuing reports of very strong surge throughout the day that didn't start to subside till after 1600 and the Coast Guard closed the harbor till about that time. That was supposedly 11.5 hours after the initial hit by the Tsunami. A 50' sailboat that went in Honokohau just before I did had strong surge that required the help of a small army for them to get into their slip. Honokohau Harbor has no finger piers, just fixed concrete docks with mooring buoys kind of like a Med Tie, Bumper boats is the only way to handle getting into your slip in a surge with this setup. Fortunately, those who got in before, mostly twin screw power boats, hung around to help their later arriving bretheren and us poor sailors get into our slips. In the short time between my coming in and the boat that tried it before me, conditions had ameliorated quite significantly though there was still surge and strong eddies. I was solo and really appreciated the crew of helpers that greeted me though I didn't have to have their help, this time. The harbor fared pretty well with only two boats sunk that hadn't gone to sea. The bow or stern of the boats went under the concrete docks when the ocean ran out and the high crest of the incoming wave flooded them. There was quite a bit of damage to houses and cars at Kealakekua Bay with one house floating out to sea and a number of cars and a few other houses flooded. The King Kamehameha Hotel had their lobby flooded as was the coastal road. Fresh fish for the first come on Alii Drive, the coast road in Kailua town.

Other harbors didn't fare as well. A private marina in Keehi lagoon on Oahu had about half their floating piers come adrift and the piers and boats ended up on the beach. The State's fixed Piers, which are/were in pretty bad shape, also took a lot of gas along with the boats that stayed in their slips. Maui had problems and their harbors and were still closed long after all the other harbors had been reopened by the Coast Guard. Haleiwa, on Oahu's north shore, had a brand new floating finger pier get trashed. Fortunately none of the boats moored to it suffered serious damage. don't know how the boats survived as the pier looked like pick up sticks. Compared to Japan, we got buy with just a few scratches here.