Still healing

The ocean can be many things. Unforgiving. Challenging. Healing. Especially healing, Especially for Kailua Canoe Club. A year removed from a near-fatal accident involving one of its paddlers, the Kailua crews will be on the beach at Hale O Lono preparing to cross the Kaiwi Channel in the 59th Molokai Hoe. For Jordan Wong, Julian Wicker and B.J. Bagood, it’s not just about finishing. It’s about finishing safely with all nine crew members.

Last year, the three were in the Kailua 1 crew that saw Luke Evslin sliced by the propeller of their escort boat when making the first water change. Evslin was deeply cut in five places, but the blade missed his spinal cord and critical arteries and organs.

Evslin was pulled back into the escort boat, which turned back to Molokai. The rest of the crew continued to paddle on, not knowing Evslin’s condition or if their escort boat would be back with relief paddlers, water and food.

"It definitely made us grow as individuals, to go through something that traumatic," said Wicker, who was sitting in Seat 2 when the accident happened. "It’s still a blur. We just saw blood and heard Luke screaming.

"They told us to keep going and it finally sunk in that maybe we would have to ‘iron’ it across the channel. We jokingly said, at least we’re taking it to Hawaii Kai. Some of us wanted to finish, but we had to decide whether to be heroes or be stupid."

Nearly 4 hours and 30 miles later, the escort boat returned with head coach Hank Leandro off Koko Head. The crew told him that they wanted to finish the race and "I told them they had nothing to prove, they had crossed the channel," Leandro said. "We came in at the Hui Nalu halau site (at Maunalua Bay), talked, had a group hug, and decided we’d go to the finish line."

The crew left their canoe and rode the escort boat to the finish line off the Hilton pier. There was still no word about Evslin, who had been flown to Maui Memorial.

Amazingly, Evslin was able to call Leandro that night after surgery.

"He said he was the luckiest guy in the world," Leandro said. "I couldn’t believe he was saying that after all that happened, but he’s right. It could have gone the other way."

In a phone call this week from his home on Kauai, Evslin said he had been paddling twice a week for about a month.

"I’m doing extremely well," he said. "My paddling almost feels like it’s back to where I was, but I know I’m not 100 percent.

"I knew I was not ready for the channel this year, but I just made a 13-month plan and definitely I’ll do it next year."

Evslin said the accident was a blessing in disguise in several respects. It had race organizers alter when the first water change can be made — from 30 minutes after the start off La‘au Point to now 45 — as well as push for escort boats to have propeller guards.

"That extra 15 minutes is going to eliminate the madness, the chaos of having 330 people in the water at the same time," said Evslin, referring to 110 canoes each having three relief paddlers making the first change. "It calms things way down.

"There was not much room for our (escort) boat to maneuver after we got dropped in the water. The boat fishtailed and I got hit."

Evslin said his thoughts will be with Kailua on Sunday, and he wishes them a safe and successful crossing. However, he will commemorate the anniversary by literally moving on; he and Sokchea, his wife of three months, are moving into the yurt he built on an acre of land in Kapahi above Kapaa.

"Luke will be on our minds," said Brad Wong, who was steering the second Kailua canoe last year. "We know he would like to be with us."

Not all of the paddlers in Evslin’s crew returned to compete for Kailua this season. Some changed clubs, others took the year off for various reasons.

"In some ways it’s like a college coach who lost a whole senior class," Leandro said. "The guys, we have been working really hard. We should finish in the top 20.

"We’ll be thinking of Luke a lot. We’re all still healing."