Hurricane Lowell brought damaging winds, heavy rain and high surf as it passed west of the Hawaiian islands of Kauai and Niihau early Tuesday. At least two people have died in connection with Lowell, including a man on Kauai, believed to have died in the storm surge, and a man on Oahu who died due to a fallen tree. County officials said they have been in contact with Niihau, a private island with fewer than 100 residents, and the island has made no requests for assistance.
Kauai is still assessing the damage. Downed trees, debris and widespread outages were reported across the island, and over 15,000 Kauai electricity customers remained without power Wednesday.
Around the island, the storm damaged homes, pushed large rocks and boulders onto highways and beaches, and destroyed several boats at the Port Allen small boat harbor. The Waimea Pier was ripped apart, with much of its structure washed away.
One of the island's hardest-hit areas was the South Shore, where surf severely damaged oceanfront homes near Baby Beach in Poipu. One witness estimated five or six homes on a single street had been destroyed.
"The whole community is just in dire straits. Honestly, it's crazy down here," Riptides Shave Ice & Snacks owner Mindy Hibbitt told SFGATE.
Beachfront hotels and businesses were also hit hard. Photos and videos showed damage to the Sheraton Kauai Resort, Koa Kea Resort, Beach House Restaurant and Lawai Beach Resort. Access to the area was cut off immediately following the storm, as roads were torn apart and chunks of asphalt were spread across resort properties.
For Riptides Shave Ice & Snacks, a shave ice shack at Lawai Beach Resort, the storm was devastating.
"The shack was underwater, like thrown into a lagoon at the Lawai Beach Resort," Hibbitt told SFGATE. "We were able to tow it out last night, and I mean, it's completely destroyed."
Hibbitt believes a roughly 30-foot wave lifted the shack and tumbled it about 200 feet into the nearby lagoon. Hotel guests told her they heard a loud noise that night and saw the shack moving as its hurricane straps snapped.
She bought Riptides in June 2020 and has owned it for six years. The shack has occupied the beachfront location for about 25 years, making it a familiar landmark for generations of visitors and residents.
She found out what happened when her son called her the next morning. "Mom, the shack is gone," he told her. Hibbitt, who lives in Koloa, soon went to see the damage. "It's pretty crazy to see the place you spend every single day, all day, every day, like staring at the ocean, serving up goodness to the community, like gone, floating in a pond. It was pretty surreal," she said.
Now Hibbitt is waiting for an insurance adjuster and figuring out how to start over. A friend set up a GoFundMe to help her with the cost of starting over.
"I would love to rebuild. I mean, Riptides belongs there," she said. "This is my main business. This is all I have."
Nearby, Brennecke's across from Poipu Beach fared considerably better, though the oceanfront property was still dealing with sand and flooded access.
"The restaurant itself, the inside is OK. A bit of a mess. Some sand got in our prep kitchen, but we actually did pretty well. Not too much came in the building," office manager Julia Kelly told SFGATE. "It doesn't seem to be terrible inside that we know of unless there's damage that's unseen."
Outside, sand and debris remain. "Our loading dock is filled with sand. It looks like a boat ramp," Kelly said.
She said they're still assessing the property. The parking lot is underwater, Kelly said, and the road is covered in sand. Hoone Road, which runs in front of Brennecke's and Poipu Beach, remains "impassable due to debris," according to Kauai County.
Despite that, the restaurant hopes the closure will be brief. "We are planning to be open as soon as possible. We're thinking maybe hopefully by the weekend," Kelly said.
That timeline will depend on whether customers can reach the restaurant. "As long as our roads are open and the parking lot, that's the only problem," she said.
Lowell is the latest in a series of damaging storms to hit Hawaii this year. Back-to-back kona low storms in March brought extreme flooding and widespread power outages across the state, including severe impacts to Hana on Maui and Oahu's North Shore.
In August, Hurricane Lala caused another round of damage, particularly on Hawaii Island, where the storm washed out roads and bridges, damaged coffee farms, and left some communities isolated and without electricity for weeks. This was followed by Tropical Storm Moke, which brought more heavy rain and strong winds.
Now, less than a month later, Hurricane Lowell has left Kauai facing an extensive recovery.
Editor's note: SFGATE recognizes the importance of diacritical marks in the Hawaiian language. We are unable to use them due to the limitations of our publishing platform.
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This article originally published at Kauai 'in dire straits' after Hurricane Lowell.