After Hurricane Lowell: Kaua’i Is In Pain

Aftermaths Last a Long Time

The Island of Kaua’i. Map is courtesy of Hawai’i Guide.

We were warned days in advance that tropical storms were headed our way and to stock up on water and food. We did not know if Kaua’i would bear the brunt of a direct hit until late in the evening of September 7, when it became clear that Hurricane Lowell would create its havoc from about 100 miles offshore.

Dorothy and I live in an apartment on the top (fourth) floor of Sun Village in Lihue. Look at the map’s East Side. The airport is about a mile away. Sun Village is a 55 and up community, and three buildings contain over 140 apartments. Cars are parked outside and many beautiful trees grace the grounds.

We were watching a Hercule Poirot mystery when all the lights went out and the TV and internet died. A message on my phone said the electric company would be working to restore service as soon as possible. Flashlights and a bathroom battery-powered lamp took care of illumination needs. But for how long?

In the meantime the growling wind continued non-stop and the noise was very loud. We couldn’t see anything, and the floor-to-celing plate glass windows in our living room and bedroom shook and grumbled constantly. At one point Dorothy noticed a slight bending in the living room window, which made us scramble to our bedroom where, surprisingly, and happily, the rumbling was somewhat quieter.

We both slept well and awoke to a beautiful morning. A dear friend showed up with a delightful surprise: hot coffee! The hospital cafeteria, about a block away, had pots of it going. Oh, happy day!

The scene outside was grim with many uprooted trees. One tree, the especially beautiful tulip tree with orange flowers, lay on the ground with its root end totally naked. But the many stately Norfolk pines appeared unscathed.

All traffic lights were dead and few drivers were out. When we decided to drive to Safeway to see if it might be open, the drivers were extremely courteous. We all stopped at crosswalks and took turns continuing on. Safeway was closed, so home we went, with four stories to climb. Good for the heart!

The lack of power continued. But every so often I’d flip a switch, knowing full well that nothing would happen, but I did it anyway. For the first couple of days, we could get no current local information as to the extent of damages. TMs seemed to work, but no phone calls.

Keeping phones charged was a challenge. We scoured hospital hallways seeking outlets, but none were found. A dear friend gave us a charger port we installed in our car and we connected our iPhones to it. We took a drive to Koloa, about 20 minutes away, and saw dead trees all over the place. All the vegetation had been impacted, and in one area traffic had been halted to removed trees from the highway.

Kauai’s highway system consists of two-lane roads. There are no freeways. If one lane gets blocked, traffic cannot move. It’s not unusual to have multi hour-long waits after an accident or if one lane needs repair work.

The hardest hit places were the north and south shores. Please look at the map to see where they are. These areas are where tourists love to stay because of the beautiful beaches. Entire properties were wiped away. Photos showed the contents of homes displayed in the streets. A damaged grand piano lay on its side.

By day three, we were receiving local updates. Power was still out in most areas. Restoring it meant having to disentangle fallen power lines from the structures that bore them, mostly trees, and to reconnect them on upright ones. Fallen power lines are a dangerous mess because some lines may still hold power. Workers came to Kaua’i from other islands to help with this arduous process.

By the afternoon of September 10 some traffic lights near our home were working! Would we be getting power soon? At 8 p.m. the lights came back on! We were reading on our bed, flashlights in hand, when the room lit up. Switches had been left on. We checked the freezer and everything was rock solid. The fridge was still cool and now we could see what was in it.

We plugged in our phones and sighed. We felt like we had won some sort of war by being able to function for three whole days without electricity.

I stepped back and began looking at what was really happening. We had power, but most of the island did not. As of yesterday, 10 days after Lowell, power still had not come back to 18% of the island’s residents.

If you look at the map you’ll see that most of Kaua’i is mountainous. Many people have chosen to live in extremely isolated places, and restoring power there can take months.

At the Pau Hana farmers market on Monday, a lovely woman selling all sorts of vegetables and papayas, told me she still had no power. Yet here she was carrying on.

I’ve been feeling profoundly sad for Kaua’i. It’s my home and I feel a closeness to it that I have never felt for any other place I’ve lived. I think of the people who live here and how they will adapt to whatever is required of them. I think of my selfishness and how thrilled I was to have power after three full days without.

Kaua’i is hurting. She needs time to heal. And she does not need visitors. Accommodations for tourists is a big issue right now, and there are no fixed answers. Some very close friends called recently to say they wanted to come see us. We asked them to please choose another island. There are simply too many unknowns right now. And many parks and favorite tourist areas remain closed.

Kaua’i is the oldest major island in Hawaii, millions of years older than Hawaii Island. It packs so much beauty in its small space, it’s no wonder that over 1,000,000 visitors come here each year. Our resident population is about 75,000.

They say that time heals all wounds. And Kaua’i and all of us who live here treasure that time.

Thank you so much for reading So You Want To Live In Hawaii.