FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM
A mudslide onto Kamehameha Highway covered all four lanes of the roadway just north of Waikalani Drive, between Mililani and Wahiawa, yesterday. Civil Defense Coordinator Francis Pedro, left, and Civil Defense Logistics Officer Gary Susag assessed the problem.
Mud closes highway
as Central Oahu soaksThe state orders an adjacent landowner
to finish a barrier to prevent future runoff
State transportation officials ordered a private landowner to finish construction of a berm to prevent any more mudslides like the one that closed Kamehameha Highway near Mililani yesterday, said spokesman Scott Ishikawa.
The slide occurred during a torrential downpour and covered four lanes of the highway between Waikalani Drive and Leilehua Golf Course Road. Police closed the highway about 1:39 p.m.
The property where the slide originated sits atop a hill on the east side of the highway. Owner Pine Spurs had been required to build a berm to prevent runoff from the property, Ishikawa said.
Pine Spurs spokeswoman Barbara Tanabe said, "The company was still in the process of building berms when the storm hit."
The company did a conservation plan, which called for berms, for which it received a permit to build, Tanabe said. Pine Spurs employees worked until sundown yesterday to finish the berm.
The state is investigating whether Pine Spurs has to pay the cost of the cleanup.
After the rains started, volunteer Oahu Civil Defense Coordinator Francis Pedro drove by to check the area.
"It was like a waterfall coming down," Pedro said. "Mud came down five minutes after that. A big chunk came down five minutes after that, breaking away from the side of the mountain."
FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM
Highway Maintenance Supervisor Bill Simpson surveyed the slide on Kamehameha Highway.
The water cut a 50-foot-wide swath out of the hillside, stripped almost bare of vegetation.
Pedro took responsibility for shutting down the highway.
"Water was rushing down, and cars were trying to get through," Pedro said. "I had to turn the vehicles around."
The mud was 4 inches deep in some places, said Wahiawa police Sgt. Henry Holcombe. "When it's wet, even if you go slowly there's not any traction."
Work crews with a backhoe arrived at about 4 p.m. to clear the grass, branches and thick red mud that covered both sides of the four-lane highway and the grassy median.
Police and Civil Defense workers were kept busy rerouting motorists onto the H-2 freeway.
An angry motorist headed toward Wahiawa swore at a police officer when he had to be turned around at the Waikalani Drive end of the slide.
Another motorist yelled an obscenity at Joseph Vierra, a 75-year-old volunteer Civil Defense traffic coordinator posted at the Leilehua Golf Course end of the slide. "We get this all the time," he said. "Sometimes they throw soda cans and beer bottles, even threats."
But he was sympathetic.
"They get frustrated," said Vierra. "They live right down the road."
Holcombe added: "The poor motorists haven't had any luck. You gotta feel bad for them.
"Monday to Friday, you get caught in the traffic, and on weekends you want to go to the beach and you're caught in traffic."
Police reopened the Wahiawa-bound lanes about 6:30 p.m. and the Honolulu-bound lanes about 7:05 p.m.
Return of trades should end
spate of weird Oahu weather
The predicted return of the tradewinds today should give Central Oahu residents a break from the conditions that spawned a thunderstorm yesterday, a tornado on Saturday and sudden heavy rains over the past several days.
Thunderstorms with heavy rains formed about 1:30 yesterday afternoon, prompting the weather service to issue a flash flood watch for the entire island and an urban and small-stream flood advisory for Central Oahu.
"This is one of the biggest thunderstorms we've seen on the island," said Bob Farrell, National Weather Service lead forecaster.
The storm dumped 2.28 inches in Mililani, 2.07 inches in Waipio, 1.99 inches in Lualualei and 1.29 inches in Waiawa between 1 and 5:30 p.m., Farrell said.
And according to weather service radar readings, rain was falling at a rate of 4 to 6 inches an hour in some areas of Central Oahu.
The heavy rains are blamed for a mudslide that closed Kamehameha Highway for several hours in both directions between Waikalani Drive and Leilehua Golf Course Road.
Weather service officials said there have been no tradewinds for weeks, opening the door for the creation of unstable atmospheric conditions over the state. Yesterday's thunderstorms were the result of a convergence of sea breezes combined with daytime heating over land. As the warm air rises, cool air moves in to replace it, forming clouds, Farrell said.
The clouds moved southwest from Central Oahu toward Leeward Oahu and then out to sea yesterday. Weather officials canceled the flood advisory at 3:30 p.m. and the flood watch at 4 p.m.
Similar conditions dumped two to three inches of rain in Central Oahu between 1 and 3 p.m. Saturday, prompting flood warnings and spawning a tornado spotted on the Koolau mountains near Mililani.
On Thursday, heavy rains caused flooding that temporarily closed some roads in Central Oahu.
