On Saturday, October 27th, Hawaii had another Tsunami scare that fortunately turned out to be nothing more than an exercise in evacuation procedures. Around 7:00 in the evening my wife and I were watching NGN 2 and there was an announcement that there had been an earthquake on the mainland and that Hawaii could possibly be affected by a Tsunami. My wife and I were very surprised that none of the English channels caught it. Almost an hour later, it was finally on the news but the announcer said that Hawaii would not be affected. A few minutes later the sirens went off and we checked the news again and apparently it was decided that Hawaii would be hit by the first wave at 10:30 p.m. I immediately got a phone call from my Supervisor asking me to come in to work as we had to get our 4 boats and 3 submarines at least 4 miles out from Waikiki in case we did get hit by a tsunami. The traffic was amazing! Luckily I rode my bike and I was able to make great time because none of the cars were moving!
Once I got to Pier 40 I immediately was put on one of the submarines and we immediately left the dock. There was myself on the Submarine and 2 crew on the tug boat pulling the submarine. The view was fantastic! Lots of boats trying to get out of the harbor and many police and harbor police cars going back and forth which provided an amazing light show! I was so upset that I didn’t bring a camera! We got out in very good time and I sat on the submarine watching all of the lights. Fortunately, there was no tsunami and we had to wait for the all clear to return to the harbor which came around 5:30 a.m. on Sunday. It turned out to be a very long night and I was very happy that I didn’t have to work the next day as I felt like I had Jet lag!