Rogue Wave

by Boyd Morrison

  Tom and Jake came trotting back carrying one kayak each over their heads. The kayaks didn't look that much different from the ones Lani had been on before: about 11 feet long, bright yellow, with black nylon around the seating area. The boys turned and ran back to get the other kayaks and gear.

  In another five minutes, all of them had their life vests on, and the kayaks were bobbing in the gentle surf. To the left was the enclosed waters of Kuhio Beach, protected by a breakwater. To the right, waves crashed into the beach, but the sea was mild where the kayaks floated.

  "Shouldn't be too bad getting past the waves today," Jake said.

  Lani saw that Mia was apprehensive. She lowered her voice to give Mia some tips.

  "Just keep the kayak pointed straight out. There's an undertow at this point, so the waves will be small."

  Mia waded up to her knees and sat on the side of the raft to get in. She slipped off and sank to her shoulders. Jake laughed, but rushed over to pick her up. She tentatively balanced herself on his arm as she climbed in. After two more false starts, she finally perched primly on the sit-on-top kayak.

  "You sure you've done this before?" Jake said.

  Mia nodded. "It's been a while since I did it the last time."

  "We'll head out past the breakers," Tom said. "Then maybe we could turn and head up towards Diamond Head. I've heard there are some killer houses along the beach there, but they're hard to see except from the ocean."

  They started paddling. When the first waves broke over the front of their kayaks, Mia let out a little scream. Lani laughed. She was finally in her element.

  "Come on," Lani said. "It's not that bad."

  "Remember to put the paddle sideways into the water, Mia!" Tom yelled. "Come on!"

  The boys pulled forward easily, and they looked a little surprised to see Lani keep up with them. Mia fell behind immediately, her paddling technique abysmal.

  With a few more minutes of practice, and with the others slowing down, she was able to keep up with them. The trip out took longer than expected as they fought the stiffened breeze coming off the ocean. After 20 minutes, they got about a half-mile out and they turned east toward the towering walls of Diamond Head.

  As they turned, Lani thought for a second that she heard a sound coming from the direction of the shore. But the breeze picked up again, whistling as it whipped over the water, and she couldn't even hear the roar of the surf.

  Chapter 16

  10:10 AM

  1 hour, 12 minutes to Wave Arrival Time

  Kai's frustration mounted as they failed to make much headway in deciphering the conflicting data. Although he had issued the tsunami warning, it was based on little more than the fact that they'd lost contact with Christmas Island. Kai was beginning to think he'd acted hastily, but he couldn't take the chance that a destructive tsunami was headed their way. Not with so many beachgoers out for the holiday, his daughter among them.

  Reggie had been able to contact Dr. Niles Aspen, the lead scientist on Johnston Island. After Reggie explained the situation over the satellite link, the scientists made preparations to get as many people into the supply plane as they could. But two would have to stay behind. Dr. Aspen would be one of them, and they planned to talk to him again when he was at a safer location.

  Brad had no more success getting in touch with Teresa and the kids. Kai just had to hope that they were following the other tourists and getting off the beach.

  "Let's go over this again," Kai said. "We're still missing something."

  Reggie leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head as he thought out loud.

  "OK. Let's see. There is virtually no chance that an undersea earthquake that small could cause any kind of sizable tsunami, let alone one that could destroy Christmas Island."

  "Why not?" asked Brad. Normally, Kai would have asked him to stay out of it, but since they were short-handed, he thought Brad's questions might help them look at the situation in a new light.

  "No quake that small has ever generated an ocean-wide tsunami," Kai said, "unless the earthquake triggered a landslide."

  "OK. So what about a landslide?"

  Reggie and Kai looked at each other and shook their heads.

  "Maybe," Kai said.

  "Maybe?" Brad said. "All you have is 'maybe'?"

  "Look, we just don't have any reason to suspect that that region of the Pacific would be prone to landslides. Underwater landslides usually occur near the edge of a continental shelf because sediment has to pile up over hundreds or thousands of years. The region we're talking about is nowhere near a continental shelf."

  "Yeah, but are you sure it couldn't be a landslide?" Brad said.

  "No. At this point, I don't think we can rule out anything."

  Some of the deadliest tsunamis in recorded history were caused by landslides. In 1998, an underwater landslide off the coast of Papua New Guinea caused a tsunami that killed over 2000 beach villagers. Some scientists even theorized that a massive tsunami could be caused by the collapse of the Cumbre Vieja volcano in the Canary Islands, sending a wave over 100 feet high to devastate the entire Atlantic coast of the United States. Of course, the theory was in dispute, but the other landslide tsunamis in the past meant the threat of an avalanche triggering a tsunami in the Pacific basin couldn't simply be dismissed.

  Reggie threw up his hands. "So we have an earthquake that's too small to make a tsunami, no known landslide risks, no sensor reading from Christmas Island, and no way to get in touch with anyone there."

  "And," Kai said, "the earthquake was in a location where no quake has ever been recorded before."

  "So you're saying the tsunami came out of nowhere?" Brad said.

  At that moment, Kai happened to look up at one of the TVs. Headline News was running the story of the missing TransPacific flight. One of the anchors spoke with the TransPac logo over his left shoulder. Then the image shifted to a graphic of the Pacific Ocean. A line stretched from Los Angeles and abruptly ended in the middle of the ocean due south of Hawaii.

  "That's funny," Kai said. "It looks like the plane went down where the earthquake epicenter…"

  And that's when it hit him. Kai knew what had happened. All of the pieces fell into place. It was incredible, but it was the only explanation that fit.

  Kai's hands started trembling. His teeth began to chatter, and he took a deep breath to get it under control. He was the director. The leader. He had to set an example, but what he really wanted to do was curl into the fetal position and pretend he was going to wake up and find out it was a dream.

  Reggie saw that Kai was struggling to keep it together. "Hey boss, what's the matter?"

  "We've completely ignored one explanation. It's crazy, but everything fits. I hope to God I'm wrong, knock on wood." Kai rapped the frame of the cork bulletin board on the wall. Even though he knew he wasn't wrong, he was hoping that some little superstitious ritual would ward off the inevitable.

  "What are you talking about?" Reggie said.

  "OK," Kai said, "here's the deal. Remember that discussion we had about Crawford and Mader?"

  Reggie furrowed his brow for a second, then snapped his fingers and smiled. "Right! Yeah, I said their research was fun, but it was a waste of time. You said…"

  Reggie abruptly stopped, the smile vanishing. He looked at Kai incredulously, and Kai could tell he'd struck a nerve. Kai nodded toward the TV, which still showed the map. For a moment, Reggie looked at the television, baffled at the connection. Then his expression changed to horror.

  In that instant, he knew, too.

  Reggie launched himself out of his chair. "You're not serious!"

  "We have to consider it."

  "Oh crap!" Reggie said with a look of stunned disbelief. "Well, this is just perfect. I just finished remodeling my kitchen last month. Took me close to two years."

  Brad, who had been watching this exchange in confused silence, couldn't take it any longer. "Not serious about what? Who are Crawford
and Mader? What's going on?"

  "You don't want to know," Reggie said.

  "Yes, I do! What the hell does this have to do with Reggie's kitchen?"

  "In about an hour," Kai said, "Reggie's kitchen won't be there any more."

  Chapter 17

  10:15 AM

  1 hour, 7 minutes to Wave Arrival Time

  Because of the Memorial Day holiday, only three people staffed Hawaii Civil Defense: Brian Renfro, the duty officer in charge, Michelle Rankin, another junior duty officer, and Ronald Deakins, the state services coordinator. Their training had them in automatic mode.

  The first step had already been accomplished: activating the sirens and starting the EAS broadcast. That part had been relatively simple. Now began the more difficult task of coordinating with the various county, state, and federal agencies that would be looking to them for what to do. Despite the fact that there were only three of them, the HCD bunker seemed to be a hive of activity. All of them were on the phone.

  Renfro had the governor and the mayor of Honolulu on conference call. Both were on their way downtown to their offices.

  "What's your ETA, Governor?" Renfro said.

  "I'll be back at the Capitol in a few minutes. The holiday traffic was already bad, and more people are getting on the road every minute. My cabinet is spread out all over the city. We've been trying to get in touch with them since we left the hotel."

  "And you, Mayor?"

  The smooth patrician voice of Mayor Carl Rutledge came over the line. "I was over at Pearl, so it's looking more like fifteen minutes if the traffic doesn't get worse, even with the police escort."

  "Who's in charge there?" the governor asked.

  "Well, I am, ma'am," said Renfro. "Vice Director Dennis is on Kauai, and there's no way he can get back in time."

  "Renfro, what are we looking at here?" the mayor asked. "Is this going to be another false alarm?"

  "Sir, you know I can't tell that for sure. What I do know is that we lost contact with Christmas Island, including the tide sensor, and the PTWC issued a tsunami warning."

  "Better safe than sorry, Carl," Governor Kalama said.

  "I suppose," the mayor said, "but dammit, we're already looking at a budget deficit. We can't have this happen every year."

  "Sir, we should know more in a few minutes when the wave is supposed to reach Johnston Island."

  On the other side of the room, Michelle Rankin talked to Pearl Harbor's military liaison, an aide to the Commander of US Pacific Command. The leader of the USPACOM was responsible for all US armed forces over half the world's surface.

  "Lieutenant, we do have procedures for this…" Rankin said.

  "But the last drill was for a three hour window. Now, you're telling me I have about an hour?"

  "That's right."

  "Ma'am, do you know what it takes for a Navy ship to set sail? It ain't like hopping in your Sea Ray and shooting out of the marina."

  "How long would it take if you started right now?"

  "Two hours minimum. The engines aren't even hot."

  "Look, I'm just telling you how much time you have. You can protest all you want. It's not going to change. Plus you need to get all of the aircraft out of the coastal air bases. We're recommending moving them to Wheeler."

  "Well, you see, that's another problem. Most of our pilots are out on leave or at ceremonies away from the bases. We can try to get them back to base, but the way the traffic is moving, we'll be lucky to get a quarter of them up in the air."

  Rankin scribbled a note about the military aircraft and handed it to Ronald Deakins, who had the responsibility for coordinating with the civilian airports and seaports. He was on the phone with the Chief of Operations at Honolulu International, which shared runways with Hickam Air Base.

  "That's right, sir," Deakins said. "You've got about an hour before the wave arrives."

  "And the all-clear? When will that be?"

  "I can't say for sure."

  "Well, I can't keep the planes circling forever."

  "Believe me, sir. We will let you know as soon as the danger has passed."

  "Flights are going to be backed up all day because of this, you know."

  "I realize that, sir."

  "Do we need to evacuate the terminals?"

  "Not at this time. They're far enough from shore to be out of immediate danger. We're only concerned about the runways at this point. But we recommend that you take everyone off the planes just in case."

  "What a headache. You better hope you're not making us do all this for nothing."

  "And you, sir, better hope we are."

  * * *

  The established procedure of the tsunami warning system included notifying the Civil Air Patrol, an auxiliary of the US Air Force that flew search and rescue missions and other operations that the military and government didn't have the resources to do on their own. In the event of a tsunami warning, their duty was simple.

  Off shore and in remote locations, it was likely that surfers and boaters would not hear the sirens. Helicopters and planes that were equipped with loudspeakers would fly over the coastlines broadcasting the warning. Each aircraft was responsible for a particular section of the coastline.

  During past tsunami warnings, the CAP had met with moderate success. In many cases, the surfers would heed the warnings and paddle into shore. But there were plenty of others who just waved at the aircraft, obviously enjoying the chance to say they had surfed a tsunami.

  One of the CAP volunteers, an eager 19-year-old pilot named Michael Perkins, flew a Cessna outfitted with a loudspeaker that he had installed himself. Although he had tested it extensively on the ground at Hickam, he hadn't had an opportunity to drill with it yet. The tsunami warning would be his first chance to try it in action.

  He made all the required pre-flight checks and then took off from the runway that Hickam Air Base shared with Honolulu International. However, because he had not tested the loudspeaker in flight, he missed the minor mistake he had made in wiring it to the plane's electrical system. On the ground, with the plane stable, the system worked perfectly. But in flight, the vibration and maneuvers of the plane loosened a wire to the point that it contacted the metal of the plane and shorted out, rendering the loudspeaker mute.

  Inside the cockpit of the plane, the roar of the engine and the wind made hearing the loudspeaker impossible, even if it was working. So Michael Perkins had no idea that his warnings to those in the water would go unheard as he patrolled his designated area along Waikiki Beach.

  Chapter 18

  10:19 AM

  1 hour, 3 minutes to Wave Arrival Time

  With two minutes before the tsunami was expected to arrive at Johnston Island, Niles Aspen was on speaker phone in the Ops Center. He and the other scientist to stay behind, Brent Featherstone, were both biologists from the University of London.

  Kai had wanted them on the line to describe the tsunami in case they lost the feed from the tide gauge, which was real-time. But Dr. Aspen had a surprising source of information for them.

  "Dr. Tanaka, to help educate our students, we have equipped ourselves with a video camera that has its own separate link to the satellite network to broadcast photos at 60-second intervals. But there is absolutely no reason that we couldn't change that to a real-time video broadcast." He gave Reggie the Internet address of the page where they would see the video feed.

  Reggie typed it in, and they saw a picture of the Johnston Island runway, slightly disjointed because the frame rate through the various satellite and Internet networks was bogging down. The twin-engine supply plane carrying their five comrades was on its takeoff roll. In a few seconds, it lifted into the air and circled the island to wait until it was clear to land again.

  Kai asked Reggie if he could record what they were seeing. In a blur of motion that was too fast for Kai to follow, Reggie started a recording application.

  "Voila! This should provide for some interesting analysis later."
r />   Kai had already told Aspen about the loss of contact with Christmas Island. The British scientist seemed remarkably composed.

  "Well," came Aspen's voice through speaker, "we have Charlotte and the rest safely away. I have to say, Dr. Tanaka, this is all quite exciting for us. Just what we needed to punch up our normal routine." A muffled voice came through behind Aspen's. "And Brent reminds me, we even have a thermos of tea to help us weather the storm, as it were."

  "Believe me, Dr. Aspen," Kai said, "I hope I'm wrong."

  "I don't know what more we could do."

  "You'll be our first confirmation as to whether were dealing with a true tsunami or not. You're on a concrete structure, correct?"

  "It couldn't be more solid. You Yanks certainly don't mind wasting construction material. This is the safest place we can be within walking distance. I dare say it might be the strongest structure on the island by the look of it. We didn't bring any vehicles, of course."

  "How high are you?"

  "I would say we're 30 feet above the ground."

  The camera panned around to show a wide flat roof, and then the jaunty figure of Dr. Aspen in a wide-brimmed hat, T-shirt, and shorts, holding a large phone to his ear as he waved to the camera. The voice came out slightly ahead of the image from the camera, so it looked like a badly dubbed foreign film.

  "We are now moving the camera to the edge of the roof facing the ocean. As you mentioned, the tsunami should arrive from the southeast, so that is the direction that you will be looking."

  After a few more seconds of nausea-inducing wobbles, the camera came to a stop atop a tripod, with Dr. Aspen now out of the picture. A narrow road led away from the building, passing several structures before it petered out at the beach. In the distance, breakers could be seen curling over the reef that encircled the island.