29 inches.That’s the amount of rain that fell on Hilo, my former hometown, between Friday evening and yesterday. Overloaded streams flooded more than a hundred homes in the Waiakea Uka suburb upslope of town. Flood control channels overflowed into Hilo’s picturesque bayfront area. Landslides closed highways and roads along the Big Island’s Hamakua Coast. Schools closed on […]
Look at this vintage film I found—eruptions at Kilauea volcano in 1959 and 1960.Both eruptions were significant. The first half of the video shows the Nov. 1959 eruption at Kilauea Iki crater, which produced fountains of lava up to 1,400 feet high. Because of its convenient location near Kilauea’s summit, near the visitor center and volcano observatory, the
The Big Island has more coral in the waters near its shores than any other major Hawaiian island.New maps from a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration coral reef studyshow that live coral covers 57 percent of the waters surrounding the Big Island. That’s more than 29 square miles of living reef.The NOAA findings support previous studies
A finger of lava from Kilauea’s quarter-century old eruption crept to within a mile of the Big Island’s Royal Gardens subdivision this morning.You might remember the now largely-abandoned subdivision east of Kilauea as the epicenter of Hawaii eruption news from 1983 to 1990. Over the years, flows from Kilauea’s Puu Oo vent have claimed 189
Is NCL going to shut down its Hawaii cruises? That rumor was posted on the Web this morning.Hawaiirama.com suggested that Norwegian Cruise Lineswould be suspending all of its Hawaii cruise operations. The rumor was based on information received from Bruce Fisher, a contributor to the site. Fisher also posted the rumor on his own Hawaii Vacation Blog
Travel + Leisure Magazine’s 2008 list of the world’s 500 best hotels features 16 properties from Hawaii.The annual list is determined from a poll of T+L readers, who graded their experiences at hotels and resorts worldwide.The highest ranking Hawaii resort this year?The Big Island’s consistently top-ranked Four Seasons Resort Hualalai, which broke into the T+L list’s Top
San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom got engaged in Hawaii last weekend—to actress Jennifer Siebel. Newsom’s a colorful figure, best known for issuing 4,000 marriage licenses to gay couples, and for having an affair with his campaign chair’s wife.The Big Question, according to California’s Sen. Dianne Feinstein, was: When? When she asked him in public, Newsom declined
It’s the 25th anniversary of the Kilauea volcano eruption on the Big Island.Just after midnight on Jan. 3, 1983, molten lava began pouring from a freshly-opened crack in a thick ohia forest a few miles east of Kilauea’s summit. It hasn’t stopped since. Then just kids from nearby Hilo, a bunch of us packed into a
When will the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel open again? Not soon.The Mauna Kea shut down after the October 2006 Big Island earthquake caused serious structural damage and safety concerns. According to itsWeb site, the 43-year-old resort is promising a December 2008 re-opening, after $150 million worth of work.Why a two-year delay?According to a Honolulu Star-Bulletin story, the
