Sewage backup forces Hanauma to close
The city reopened Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve on Thursday afternoon, about 90 minutes after a sewage backup shut down restrooms.
The nature preserve closed shortly before noon. About 1,000 people at the beach were allowed to stay.
A backup system came online, and the attraction reopened at about 1:30 p.m., city spokesman Jesse Broder Van Dyke said. No sewage got into the bay.
Pair burned by power lines
Two 26-year-old Kihei men suffered electrical burns Wednesday afternoon while working on power lines in Haiku, a Maui County police spokesman said.
One of the workers reached for a temporary jumper line, and witnesses heard a loud noise followed by an electrical arc, police said.
The men, who work for Henkels & McCoy Inc., were initially treated at Maui Memorial Medical Center and then taken to the Straub Clinic & Hospital on Oahu for further treatment. The conditions of the men were not available.
Injured tiger is euthanized
Namaste, the white Bengal tiger and main attraction of Hawaii County’s Panaewa Rainforest Zoo, died Thursday.
Namaste was euthanized after suffering complications from a broken hind leg, said Hawaii County Parks Department spokesman Jason Armstrong.
"He was really the face of the zoo and to some degree the face of the department," Armstrong said. "We’re very sad he’s no longer with us."
Namaste was 15 years old and had lived longer than any of his siblings, he said. He lived alone in a 1-acre compound at the zoo.
Armstrong said zoo officials didn’t know exactly when or how Namaste injured his hind leg because the tiger masked the injury until it became apparent last year.
During the past several months, veterinarians treated him, but the injury from the broken leg affected his mobility and he began to lose appetite and weight.
"We didn’t want him to suffer," Armstrong said.
