FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM Ferdinand Ray Cadiz showed the 400- to 500-pound boulder which crashed through his rented 10th Avenue home at about 6 p.m. yesterday, rolling across his bed before getting lodged in the closet. Cadiz was not at home when the boulder came down.

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2 men safe after
boulder plows into
Palolo house

A 400- to 500-pound rock crashes
through two bedrooms

Two Palolo Valley men were happy to be alive after a boulder crashed through two bedrooms of their 10th Avenue home last night.

"I look at life differently now," said Ki Hyun Oh. "I think I got really lucky."

Oh said he works the graveyard shift, and normally would have been asleep when the boulder came rumbling down shortly after 6 p.m. However, he was off last night.

"It really kind of spooked me, the fact that I could have been in bed," Oh said. "I think it bounced off my bed because my box springs is all messed up right now."

The boulder was about 4 feet in diameter and weighed between 400 and 500 pounds, Oahu Civil Defense spokesman John Cummings III said.

"I met the luckiest man on the island," Cummings said of Oh.

The boulder crashed through roommate Vinson Galam's bedroom wall and then through a closet and into Oh's bedroom.

The two men were in the living room of the 2035 10th Ave. home when they heard a loud sound, like something fell off a shelf, said Galam, 26.

"Then a split second later, we felt and heard a rumbling sound, like something crashed through," Galam said.

The two men went outside to investigate.

Galam said when they got back in, Oh exclaimed: "I found the boulder. It's right here."

Oahu Civil Defense and police responded.

Cummings said the boulder came loose from the back of the ridgeline.

"The boulder is still hanging in the room, leaning on the last wall," Galam said.

Galam said they were both in shock and had a few beers to calm down. Ferdinand Ray Cadiz, 30, another roommate, was at work at the time of the incident.

The three men planned to stay in the house last night. Galam said the landlady planned to contact her insurance company today.

The Department of Land and Natural Resources was notified, and the state was expected to determine the origin of the boulder.

In the past few years, several large boulders have crashed into or near Oahu homes. Most notably, a 5-ton boulder rolled down a Nuuanu hillside, killing Dara Onishi on Aug. 9, 2002, as she slept in her bedroom. In November 2002, rocks and boulders tumbled down a Hawaii Kai hillside, smashing a condominium complex, damaging vehicles and forcing several residents to relocate for months.