University of Hawaii & Manoa hit hard by a ‘freak’ flash flood

[Kater]

I am posting here to ask for your prayers during a difficult time. Beginning on the night before Halloween 9.96 inches of rain fell in a 24 hour period over Manoa valley, with the heavist being 15 minutes between 6:45 and 7 p.m. when 1.29 inches fell. That's a rate of about 5 inches an hour! Needless to say, there was a lot of damage, especially to the UH-Manoa campus. The campus was not in good shape prior to the flooding, even the week before the flood I experienced something to make me believe this. I was cutting close to a low wall in order to squeeze by a group of friends that were hogging the sidewalk. My knee caught on the corner brick of the wall and pulled it right out! Then the fat brick landed squarely on my exposed toes ( I was wearing sandals). I hadn’t even attended my first class of the day and I was already bruised and bleeding in two places. It was quite a shock transferring from UW-Madison back home and realizing how decrepit the UH campus is in comparison. I won’t babble on any longer but for those of you who are interested to learn more…I have provided links to some pictures of the damage and articles below.

Pictures:
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~smurata/flood/
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/ar...odgallery.html

Articles:
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/ar.../ln/ln01p.html
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/ar.../ln/ln27p.html


I ask that you pray no one gets sick from the mold or was infected with Leptospirosis during cleanup.
I ask that you pray for those whose homes and belongings were damaged, and ask that you pray that they get the support they need.
I ask that you pray for the scientists that lost years of research, and ask that you pray that they find a way to deal with those devastating losses.
I ask that you pray for a University and larger community that needs to come together in this trying time of rebuilding.

Thanks for reading.

[Logan]

I will definitely pray for the things you listed, Kater. I'm so sorry this "freak" flooding happened!

[KYS]

Sending prayers to all that were effected!!

[pitc9]

OMG!

Looking at all of those pictures... all the things that were lost.... I'm so sorry. I pray for everyone!!

[ramanth]

Oh Kater, how heartbreaking.

I work in a Library and seeing it in the shambles it is...

I'm definately passing on this news to my boss.

[heinz57_79]

omg!!

Hawai'i ko'u kauhale, ia'u i'ini 'oe koe palekana a hiki ia'u ho'iho'i ia ko'u Ko Hawai'i Pae 'Aina.

(My hawaiian is a little rusty, but I doubt the Protectors of the Islands care whether or not my grammar is spot on. hehe)

My thoughts are with the islands!

[wolflady]

Oh my gosh, Kate...that is so scary!! How are your toes? Prayers are on the way from me too, for everyone who was affected by this.
It looks like there was a lot of damage from this flood. What's happening on your campus? Is there a lot of re-construction to do? Are classes still in session, or was there too much damage?


**hugs**
Karen

[Karen]

Oh dear, how awful! Prayers for all, including you!

[Kater]

Originally posted by wolflady
Oh my gosh, Kate...that is so scary!! How are your toes? Prayers are on the way from me too, for everyone who was affected by this.
It looks like there was a lot of damage from this flood. What's happening on your campus? Is there a lot of re-construction to do? Are classes still in session, or was there too much damage?

Classes were cancelled on November 1st and 3rd, and we already had November 2nd off for Election day. When the students returned to campus on the 4th some classes were cancelled while other classes were relocated. Students returned to a campus littered with rotting debris and smelling of a pungent mixture between decomposing organic material and the diesel fumes coming from dozens of droning generators. As you can see on this map (http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/da...02/ln27map.gif) the flood waters ran down the center of campus affecting certain buildings more significantly. One of the two libraries on campus is closed and needs major cleanup (as the first picture link shows). Also, most of the building’s air conditioning systems are broken (yes, we need air conditioning at this time of year) and if the systems are working, they are not working very well and smell suspiciously moldy. UH has contracted with a mainland-based “emergency clean-up company that specializes in recovering buildings and materials after manmade and natural disasters” and with the help of these experts, the four most damaged buildings may be fully “cleaned and sanitized” in as little as one month.

My computer science professor told us about how she was surprisingly affected by the flood despite the fact that she was out of the country at the time. She was in Europe that week and had her car parked on campus (with permission) in the parking lot of the building where her office is located. This building was not significantly affected by the flood waters and so upon her return she was very surprised to find her car missing from the spot where she had parked it a few days earlier. She found out later that it had been towed and went to the impound lot to pick it up. When she got there, she saw her little car, covered in debris with a muddy water mark was halfway up the car door! The moral of her story was this : sometimes those camera phones REALLY do come in handy! She took pictures on the spot, before the guilty looking attendant could do anything to clean up her car, and she sent those pictures to her insurance agency very soon thereafter. She was telling us this story and seemed surprisingly upbeat about it, I mean she was just sort of laughing at the irony of it! I’ve seen this sort of attitude all over campus. People just aren’t as upset as you might expect them to be.

My knee and toes are just fine. Thanks for asking.

Thank you for all your kind words, good thoughts and prayers. They are all very much appreciated!

[BCBlondie]

Yikes!! That must have been scary! Sorry for the loss... Those pictures made me sad.. The damage looks pretty bad..

[wolflady]

Thanks for the update! I can't believe how much damage there was! I just hope that once the campus is all cleaned up and repaired...that it will be nicer than it was before! LOL

I'm glad to hear that the people's attitudes still are high despite everything
**hugs**
Karen