By now you most likely already heard that many people in Kona were awaken to a 6.6 magnitude earthquake with its epicenter just about 10 miles off the Kona coast right were the Ironman bike course is. It sounds really bad and the national news surely make it seem alot worst. Most of the damage happened at places like the Hospital and other buildings built with cement or brick. Our condo is wood and there was no noticable damage. Everything is working and only a few things were out of place. I personally was very lucky. Other people went home and shelves and electronics were down on the ground. Stores had to do a lot of work as many things just went all over the floor. Places like department stores and grocery stores had to do a lot of work to get back to normal.
I got up about 6:00 AM and got ready to go and sign up for the local 5K/10K. It is a charity run to raise money for building more bike paths in Kona. It is well worth the cause. I did not plan on racing this one like the swim Saturday but rather keep my heart rate aerobic and get my 40 minute run with a little warm down. My friend Rick and were picking our race t-shirts when the earthquake hit at about 7:10 AM local time. I was calm at first since I have been on some of these when I was a little boy in Colombia. However, the earth and the trees kept on shaking and the sound was loud so I started to get a little concerned and inmediately thought of my wife and kids. At that moment people started screaming and I hung on to a palm tree. Then it stopped. As I looked around a local Hawaiian man screamed, "get over to high ground". I thought that was premature. A tsunamy takes a while to develop and if we get a tsunami we would not feel such a strong earthquake. But people ran like crazy. I started jogging with my friend Rick and he says, "hey don't you want to get yoru t-shirt?". I said, yeah let me get it. But as I turned around everyone was gone. Then I looked back and Rick was gone too. Oh well, I jogged back to my car which was parked at higher ground and called my wife. Later I found out that the earthquake was not lava/volcano related and is not a tsunami type one. Rather it was a tectonic earthquake which means it is just a rearranging of the rock that holds the island together. The Island of Hawaii is just a big mountain that starts very deep in the ocean floor. From bottom to the top it is much higher than mount Everest.
The 5K/10K race was just delayed 15 minutes and things started to get back to normal real fast. I ran the 5K and won my age group with a 25 minute time. What do you know? Not many people in the 5K. That is what that means. I got a bag of ground coffee and a Hawaiian music CD for my efforts.
The rest of the day was fairly normal from my end. I got my bike set up with my race wheels and with a new chain and cog set. Now I just have to ride it a few times before the big day.
I would like to thank all of you who have called or email me with concern and hoping I was fine. I replied or called back all of you. Thank you. It means a lot to me.
Oh by the way, click on yesterday's blog as I updated the Queen K Highway movie. Mark Allen gets to Kona Monday and he will start his blog so check that out. See you later.