A yellow school bus pulled up to Mid-Pacific Institute at 8:15 a.m. Friday, ready to pick up kids for the last day of a spring break program.
It pulled away 20 minutes later without a single child on board. Instead of heading to Dave &Buster’s for a celebration, children and their families met with counselors on campus, trying to grapple with the sudden loss of 5-year-old Alaric K. Chiu and staffer Maria Davis, who drowned on an excursion the previous day.
Davis, 63, was paddling a plastic kayak with three boys — ages 5, 6 and 9 — aboard off Kaaawa Beach on Thursday at around 11:30 a.m. when it capsized about 150 yards offshore, according to Capt. Scot Seguirant, spokesman for the Honolulu Fire Department.
She had borrowed the kayak from a friend, Chico Salgado, who lives near the beach at Kaaawa, during a stop that wasn’t on the original itinerary for the spring break program.
HFD personnel managed to rescue the two older children, but Davis and Chiu were found unresponsive in the water. CPR was unsuccessful, and both were pronounced dead at Adventist Health Castle hospital in Kailua.
Emergency responders saw no evidence the kayakers were wearing life vests, according to Seguirant. State law requires that children ages 12 and under wear personal flotation devices when aboard kayaks and other vessels.
Salgado, who works nights, said Friday he was asleep at the time of the accident and awoke at about 11:30 a.m. to find fire and Ocean Safety personnel responding to the emergency. Salgado said it was “a beautiful day. The water was calm.”
He said Davis had asked him ahead of time if he could set up a pop-up canopy in his yard, which is on the mauka side of Kamehameha Highway just steps from a slip of sand and the water, to provide shade during their visit, which he did.
Davis, a longtime friend of his wife’s, had visited before, but “this was the first time bringing the kids,” he said.
When she asked to borrow his two-person ocean kayak with two paddles, he didn’t hesitate.
“She said, ‘Can I take your kayak out, use it?’” Salgado said. “I said, ‘Yeah, go ahead,’ and that was it. I didn’t know there was going to be kids on there or what she was going to do. I figure she’s a grown-up. …
”Because it was her borrowing it, I said, ‘Go ahead, Auntie,’ and I left it at that.”
Waves break about 200 yards offshore, Salgado said, and generally it’s calm and shallow inside the reef. Large rocks were placed in the water across from his house by area residents to create a protective area for children to play in, he said.
Salgado pointed to a small wave breaking onshore and said that even one that size could capsize a kayak. “It doesn’t take much to flip you over on a kayak.”
He said his wife is pretty broken up about the tragedy.
“She was a very beautiful lady, always happy-go-lucky,” Salgado said of Davis.
Three of the five people listed online as Spring Break Camp staff for the Mid-Pacific program are members of the Davis family. All three were at the beach at the time, according to a family member.
Davis’ daughter, Puakailima Davis, became coordinator of the Extended Learning Program at Mid-Pacific in the fall of 2017, overseeing after-school enrichment and day camps during breaks. She has a Ph.D. in education and came to Mid-Pacific from Kamehameha Schools’ early education program.
The spring break program listed Maria Davis as “camp supervisor” and Kaehukai Davis, her son, as a “camp supervisor assistant.”
“Yesterday, my Mama Kahu went home to Jesus,” kahu Wendell Davis, Maria’s husband and the chaplain at Mid-Pacific Institute, wrote on his Facebook page Friday. “I miss her so much and it hurts. Please pray for me and our children.”
Alaric was not a student at Mid-Pacific, but his family had signed him up for the spring break activities. The Honolulu Medical Examiner released his identity and age Friday. Authorities initially listed the boy as 6 years old.
A brochure for the program for students in kindergarten through fifth grade listed an Island Tour and Beach Day for Thursday. It included a drive by Dole Plantation in Wahiawa, a stop at Matsumoto Shave Ice in Haleiwa and “swim and lunch” at Kaiona Beach Park in Waimanalo.
School officials declined to offer any specifics about what happened, including whether the Kaaawa stop or the kayaking were planned, how many children and staff were there, and the lack of personal flotation devices.
“We understand there are many questions and people want more information,” Mid-Pacific President Paul Turnbull said Friday in a written statement. “However, due to the ongoing investigation and out of respect for the privacy of the families, we are unable to make any comments until all of the facts are known.
“Our priorities at this time are to fully cooperate with the authorities and support our students and families,” he said.
Turnbull informed the Mid-Pacific community of the tragedy in an email Thursday that said, in part, “It is impossible to fully express our heartbreak and shock at this time.”
At the time of the accident Thursday, the weather in the area was sunny with gentle winds of about 10 mph from the north-northeast and 1- to 3-foot surf on east-facing shores, according to Matthew Foster, meteorologist for the National Weather Service’s Honolulu Office.
On Friday, lei hung from a beach-side tree next to the narrow strip of sand at Kaaawa, near the intersection of Puakenikeni Road and Kamehameha Highway.
The weeklong “day camp” program offered a range of activities, from trips to the Waikiki Aquarium to Bishop Museum. Parents could choose the full five days for $550 or a one-day pass for $150.
Students are due to return to campus Tuesday. The school has canceled its Professional Learning Day for faculty and staff scheduled for Monday.
“Instead we will come together to grieve and support one another,” Turnbull said.
On Tuesday, Mid-Pacific counselors will be available to students, parents, faculty and staff. The Student Assistance Support Team includes the Hawaii Center for Children and Families and will offer individualized and group counseling.
Ray Sanborn, president of Kama‘aina Kids, which teaches ocean safety and safe boating practices to children, said going out on the water must be properly planned and executed.
“All of our kids go through a swim test,” he said. “When you look at kayaking, the most important thing is putting on a life jacket and knowing how to wear it, being sure that it fits. The other thing is making sure you have the right boats and equipment and that you don’t have it overloaded.”
On Thursday, Sanborn was about 10 miles south of Kaaawa at Heeia State Park, which his organization manages.
“It was a beautiful day,” he said. “It was just perfect. And I can imagine what Kaaawa was like. It kind of lulls you into the sense that this is perfect, there’s no wind, the water is so calm. But underneath you’re going to have rip currents, ocean currents, things you don’t see.
“I can just see what happened,” he added. “The lady’s there with these kids, and the kayak is right there and she goes, ‘What an opportunity. What a wonderful experience we’re going to have.’ And in a matter of seconds it turned to tragedy.”
