When the Waves Didn't Come: A Tsunami Scare in Kauai
On Tuesday, July 29, 2025, around 2:30 PM, my husband and I were sitting by the pool when a sudden wave of loud Amber Alerts rippled through the air. One phone buzzed, then another, and another-like a domino effect of urgency echoing all around us. My husband quickly turned his phone off, assuming it was a typical alert from Washington State, where Amber Alerts usually signal a missing child. I didn’t even check mine—I didn’t have my phone on me.
But this time, it wasn’t a missing child. It was a tsunami warning.
An 8.6 magnitude earthquake had just struck off the coast of Russia, sending possible tsunami waves across the Pacific. And we were in Kauai.
The hotel staff remained calm and composed, advising everyone to return to their rooms. I turned on the TV and began watching live news updates, growing increasingly anxious as predictions of 10-foot waves across the Hawaiian Islands scrolled across the screen.
Soon after, the hotel issued an evacuation order. Guests with cars were given directions to higher ground, while those without transportation were offered shuttle rides. The evacuation site was a local middle school.
Everything you see on TV during natural disasters is real. Traffic was bumper-to-bumper. Gas stations were backed up. When we finally arrived at the school, the grounds were already filling with cars. Eventually, hundreds more packed into the area.
Before we left, I had made our family pack up everything from the hotel room in case we couldn’t return. I also brought my camera. Once at the school, I took it out of the bag and wandered the grounds as people continued to arrive. Despite the uncertainty, there was a strange calm in the air. Almost everyone appeared to be vacationers, treating the situation like a surreal adventure. Families played football and board games. Some laid out blankets and turned the experience into an impromptu picnic. County staff were kind and reassuring, offering a sense of comfort amid the chaos.
As I walked, I overheard a woman joking from her car, “No sea turtles in this parking lot!” She laughed and then turned to me, saying she recognized me and my camera from Poipu Beach the day before. It was such a lovely, unexpected connection. We chatted for a bit, and I gave her my card so she could find my coloring books later.
My husband, daughter, and I waited in our car at the evacuation site for nearly seven hours. After sunset, once I could no longer take photos, we streamed updates on my phone, watching channel KHON2, feeling grateful that the worst never came. Some neighboring islands saw light waves, but Kauai remained untouched. Eventually, we were allowed to return to our hotel and sleep in our own beds, grateful, relieved, and emotionally exhausted.
All was well in the end. But living through a tsunami alert-even one that didn’t materialize-is a visceral reminder of how fragile life can be, and how precious every moment truly is.
