The Tsunami Countdown

by Boyd Morrison

  “I love you too,” Rachel said. “I’ll see you when this is over.”

  She hung up. Kai stared at the phone, hoping to hell that she was right.

  Rachel immediately got on her walkie-talkie.

  “Max, come in.”

  “This is Max. Rachel, are you watching the TV?”

  “No, I’m up in the ballroom.”

  “They just issued a new tsunami warning. But now they’re saying—”

  “They’re saying it’s going to be a lot bigger, and they’re telling us to evacuate the hotel.”

  “So you are watching it.”

  “It doesn’t matter. We’ve got to evacuate.”

  “I was having problems just getting people to go back to their rooms. We’re swamped down here in the lobby.”

  “I know. You’ve been sending the guests with rooms on the first, second, and third floors to the Wailea Ballroom, right?”

  “Yes, that’s the procedure.”

  “Not anymore. Go up and tell them to leave the hotel. They should head up Kalakaua Avenue. Then have them go up Manoa Road to Woodlawn.”

  “Woodlawn? That’s got to be at least three miles away.”

  “I know. That might be far enough inland.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  How many people are going to ask me that today? Rachel thought.

  “I’m not kidding,” she said. “Just do it.”

  “Okay, but how do I convince the guests? Some of them have asked me where the best place to view the tsunami is.” Max paused for a moment. “What if we set off the fire alarm?”

  “I thought about that,” Rachel said, “but it might make people more confused. They might think it’s an alarm for the tsunami and stay where they are.”

  “Then what about the people already in their rooms?”

  “First, spread the word to the staff that we’re evacuating the hotel. Then, after you’ve informed the guests in the Wailea Ballroom of what’s going on, take as many of the front desk staff as you can spare and go room to room to make sure people know to evacuate.”

  “What if they won’t?”

  “We can’t force them to leave, but make sure they understand how dangerous the situation is. Remember, my husband works at the PTWC. If he says to get out, we’re going to damn well do it.”

  “And what about you?”

  “I’ve got five hundred guests in the Kamehameha Ballroom. I don’t leave until they do.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  10:35 A.m.

  47 Minutes to Wave Arrival Time

  Honolulu had forty-eight minutes, but the Big Island had only eleven minutes. Renfro knew that many on Hawaii wouldn’t be able to reach safety, especially if they hadn’t already started to evacuate, but they had to try. And they had one advantage that Christmas Island and Johnston Island didn’t have: the Hawaiian Islands were built by volcanoes, so they were very steep. If people walked quickly or ran, they might be able to get to a safe height. Renfro realized that every second ticking away was precious. The governor was still on her way, but he couldn’t wait even the last few minutes it would take for her to arrive. He would have to make the new announcement himself from the broadcast booth.

  By this time, several others on staff had made it in to help him out. But there were still only six of them, so he gathered them around to give the most important briefing of their lives.

  “Okay, here it is,” he said, his voice shaking. “In eleven minutes, a massive tsunami will hit the south tip of the Big Island. In a little more than thirty minutes after that, Honolulu will be hit. I will be updating the warning immediately after I’m done here.”

  One of the new arrivals, Chet Herman, spoke up. “Shouldn’t you wait for the governor—”

  “No. She’ll make another announcement later, but it’ll be at least fifteen minutes before she gets here and has a script in hand. As it is, we basically have to write off the Big Island. Nobody in this room should spend any more time on it.”

  There was murmuring at that.

  “I know it seems heartless, but I don’t think we have enough time to coordinate anything from here. They’ll have to take the warning and do their best. We’ll concentrate on Oahu.”

  Some of them nodded. With this kind of crisis, the objective was to save as many as possible. Eighty percent of the state’s population was concentrated here. There was still time to accomplish something on Oahu.

  Renfro had no idea whether people would pay attention to the new warning. The previous plans that had been broadcast were now useless or, even worse, dangerous. If the populace didn’t listen to his instructions, thousands would needlessly die.

  Cathy Aiko raised her hand.

  “What do you want me on?” she said.

  “Cathy, you need to call all the hotels and get them to evacuate the tourists. Vertical evacuation is out of the question at this point.”

  The newest hotels and office buildings were constructed to withstand anything that was within the reasonable realm of possibility, including resisting 150-mile-per-hour hurricane winds with no more than a slight sway. The lower floors would allow the water from a storm surge or tsunami to pass through the building and blow out the back wall, so that the water pressure would not put undue structural stress on the load-bearing systems.

  But no building was built to bear the impact of a twenty-story wall of water. For a wave that tall, the structure would have to survive fifty thousand tons of pressure, the weight of one hundred fully loaded 747s. Most buildings would simply collapse when the lower floors buckled, if they weren’t completely torn apart. Fleeing to a higher floor would be no refuge.

  The obstacles to getting the population to safety in such a short amount of time were too numerous for Renfro to address. After his announcement was made, many roads would become completely jammed with vehicles, despite their pleas to flee on foot. The traffic would make it that much more difficult for emergency vehicles and buses to evacuate those who couldn’t walk.

  Which led to the next problem: evacuating low-lying hospitals and nursing homes.

  Renfro pointed at the last newcomer, Thomas Kamala. “Tom, you coordinate with The Queen’s Medical Center. They need to get everyone out. They might have a little more time. They won’t be hit until we get a third or fourth wave. Make sure Tripler is ready for them. You also need to alert all of the nursing homes.”

  With over five hundred beds, The Queen’s Medical Center, located next to the Capitol building in downtown Honolulu, was the largest medical facility on the islands. Many ICU patients and premature babies would be on life support, not to mention the surgeries that were under way. They would all have to be moved to Tripler Army Medical Center, which thankfully sat on a small plateau northeast of Pearl Harbor. The patients who were not critical would have to be moved by bus, along with nursing home patients who were too feeble to move on their own. Others would have to be moved by helicopter.

  The military presence on Oahu would be especially helpful in this crisis. The fleet of Army, Navy, and Air Force helicopters—as many as could get off the ground before the first wave arrived—and the numerous commercial helicopters on the islands would be pressed into service to evacuate the hospital patients and others who couldn’t get to safety in time.

  “Michelle, you’re in charge of coordinating with the military. Get the bases around Pearl evacuated and get as many aircraft into the air as you can. We’ll need the helicopters badly, I’m guessing. The other planes can go up to Wheeler.” Wheeler Army Airfield was in mid-island Oahu. Not knowing exactly how big the waves would get, even Wheeler might not be safe, but it was the only option.

  “Ronald, you’re in charge of the airports, Honolulu International in particular. Even though the Kahului Airport is on the north side of Maui, it’s also in danger because the wave will wrap around the island. You need to get everyone out of the airports. If there are planes all ready to go, get them in the air. But they don’t have time to start boarding. We
don’t want to have them standing on the runway when the wave gets here.”

  “What about the planes coming in?” Deakins said.

  “If they don’t have the fuel to turn back to the mainland, they need to land at Wheeler. I don’t want anything landing at the commercial airports after ten minutes from now.”

  Renfro got up, and except for Chet Herman the group dispersed.

  “What about me?” Herman said.

  Renfro paused. The equipment in the broadcast room was designed to be easy to use, but he still needed to have someone operate it while he was on air. The current warning was on a loop, and he would have to break in.

  “I need you to help me with the broadcast,” Renfro said.

  Renfro seated himself in front of the camera and clenched his hands tightly on his knees. He nodded at Herman, who hit a few buttons and then pointed at Renfro. The red light on the camera came on, and Renfro began the announcement.

  “Hello, I am Brian Renfro, duty officer at Hawaii State Civil Defense.” He cleared his throat. “A tsunami warning has been issued for the entire Pacific, including the Hawaiian Islands. I am here to update that warning. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center now has clear evidence from a deep-sea buoy that a massive tsunami is headed toward Hawaii. When it makes landfall, the tsunami is expected to be over eighty feet in height. We have lost contact with Christmas Island, and we know that a huge tsunami has hit Johnston Island. At 10:45 a.m. local time, the wave is expected to make landfall at the southern tip of the Big Island. It will hit Oahu and Honolulu at 11:22 this morning. The wave arrival times for the other islands will be scrolling across the bottom of the screen. If you are listening to this on the radio, the arrival times will be broadcast at the end of this announcement.”

  He took a deep breath to steel himself for what he would say next.

  “Larger waves may follow. Again, there is a strong possibility of multiple waves, and the first wave may not be the largest wave. The biggest wave could reach over two hundred feet in height. Therefore, we are urging all residents of the Hawaiian Islands to immediately leave their present locations and evacuate as far inland as possible. If you are already in a seagoing vessel, do not return to shore. Get as far out in the ocean as you can.”

  At this point, he decided not to mention the asteroid. Without proof, he couldn’t be sure that people would take the warning seriously if he told them that an asteroid strike had caused the tsunami.

  “If you have evacuated to the upper floors of a building, you are not safe. Please leave the building immediately and walk to high ground. Only those who are incapable of walking should take vehicles.

  “Please do not panic. If you begin to walk now, you will have time to get to high ground. When we have further information, we will broadcast a new warning. But do not stay by your television. Take a portable TV or radio with you as you evacuate. Authorities will be assisting the evacuation.

  “Good luck. That is all.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  10:38 a.m.

  44 Minutes to Wave Arrival Time

  Captain Martin Wainwright peered through the cockpit window of his C-130E at the bright blue ocean below. The chatter coming over the radio was like nothing he had ever heard in his eight years of flying for the 314th Airlift Wing. Reports were being thrown around about an immense tsunami heading toward Hawaii, but from an altitude of thirty-one thousand feet, the sea looked as calm and flat as a pond in his native Tennessee. The Air Force transport under his command had been flying for more than three hours on a mission from San Diego to Hickam Air Force Base carrying three brand-new Humvees for delivery to the naval base at Pearl Harbor. He was expecting the usual milk run for him and his four crewmates: land at Hickam, secure the aircraft, get off base for a few hours of sightseeing at Waikiki, hit the barracks for some sack time, then ferry a load of equipment back to the mainland the next day. Nothing that he hadn’t done a dozen times before. But the order he was now being given by the Honolulu Air Traffic Control Center was extraordinary.

  “This is Air Force 547,” Wainwright said. He wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly. “Say again, Honolulu control. You’re closing Hickam?”

  “Roger that, 547,” the controller said, his voice clipped and strained. “You are instructed to turn back immediately to the mainland and make for the nearest possible landing site.”

  “That’s a negative, Honolulu control. We’re past the point of no return.” The four-engine turboprop had already sucked up over half the fuel in its tanks. They wouldn’t make it within three hundred miles of San Diego before they ran out of gas. Hawaii was one of the most remote archipelagos in the world, which meant that there weren’t any other choices to land.

  “Roger that, 547. You aren’t the only one. Continue on your current heading. We’ll try to make room at Wheeler for you.”

  “Affirmative, Honolulu control.”

  “And 547, be advised that we’ll be evacuating Honolulu control in thirty minutes. We’ll be turning control over to Wheeler Field at that time.”

  Wainwright glanced at his copilot in disbelief. To close down the airport was one thing, but shutting down the control center was unprecedented. The troubled look on his copilot’s face reflected his own. Their routine run to the islands had just become a nail-biter.

  Teresa had been waiting for thirty minutes, and there was still no sign of Mia and Lani. The sirens kept wailing at regular intervals, but without a radio, she didn’t know what was going on. Even though it was critically low on battery power, she had turned her cell phone back on. She had to take the chance in case the girls called her.

  The situation on the beach had changed dramatically in the last half hour. When the beachgoers finally realized that the warning siren was not a test, many of them had quickly gathered their belongings and started heading out. But many others, much to her surprise, kept on doing what they were doing. They seemed completely unconcerned about the fact that a monster wave could be headed their way.

  Even when the police had started to arrive about ten minutes after the first siren had gone off and blared their loudspeakers at the beach, some people still did not heed the warning.

  As he was making his way up the beach, one of the policemen had stopped when he reached Teresa.

  “Ma’am, you need to leave the beach immediately. There is a tsunami coming.”

  “I can’t. My daughter and her friend are somewhere on the beach, and they’re probably going to be coming back at any minute. The radio said the tsunami would be here within the hour. Is that right?”

  “We’re getting a lot of conflicting information. All I know is that we were told to get everyone off the beach as soon as possible. But I’ve done these kinds of evacuations before. We’ve got a few hours to go. You should be okay.”

  “Why isn’t everybody leaving?”

  “We always get the nuts who want to come down and see the tsunami. They figure that they’ll head up to one of the hotels and have a party when the tsunami gets here.”

  “Even after the Asian tsunami?”

  “Well, not as many nuts now, but a lot of kids think they’re invincible. I see it every time. We can’t force them to leave. It’s still a free country. Even if that means they’re free to die. I’m sorry, ma’am. Good luck.”

  He continued on at a deliberate pace. His comment about teens feeling invincible worried her.

  Surely if Mia and Lani had heard the sirens, they would have had plenty of time to get back to her by now. She had been torn about whether to leave her location and chance missing the girls if they returned to find her. But by this time, the waiting had become agonizing. She just couldn’t sit there and hope they came back. She had to do something.

  She rummaged through her bag until she found a Post-it pad and a pen. On the pad, she scribbled a note to the girls:

  Mia and Lani, I have gone to find you. If you find

  this note, go to the Grand Hawaiian and find Rachel.

  I will meet
you there. Teresa.

  The Grand Hawaiian seemed like the best place to meet if they were able to rendezvous. She certainly didn’t want them waiting around on the beach until she came back.

  Teresa took her keys and wallet out of her purse, placed the notepad at the top of the purse, and wrapped it in her towel. She could only hope that no one would steal the purse before the kids saw the note.

  She then began jogging toward Diamond Head, the direction in which she saw the girls go, yelling their names as she went.

  Within a minute, her phone rang. She looked at the number on the caller ID, hoping it was the girls. The number came up as unknown. They could have been calling from a pay phone.

  When she answered, it was a familiar voice, but one that surprised her.

  “Teresa, it’s Brad. Thank God, I finally got through to you. The lines have been jammed. Did you get my text?”

  “No. Have the girls called you?”

  “What? Aren’t they with you?”

  “They went shopping about forty minutes before the siren went off, and they haven’t come back. I’m looking for them now.”

  “Jesus! Teresa, you have to get as far away from the beach as you can. The tsunami is going to be huge.”

  “I can’t leave them here! What if they can’t hear the warning?

  “With all those sirens going off? I’m inside a concrete building three hundred yards from the beach, and I can hear them. Come on, they had to have heard it.”

  “Then why didn’t they come back to me? Something’s wrong! I’m not leaving until I find them!”

  “Okay! Calm down. We’ll figure out something. Where are you?”

  “I’m on Waikiki. But my phone’s battery is drained.”

  “I know. I got the message. If the kids call us, we’ll tell them to meet you and Rachel at the Grand Hawaiian, but you’ve got to be there before—”

  Teresa’s cell phone beeped, and Brad’s voice cut out. The display showed a blinking battery graphic and then went dead.