The incessant shriek of a tsunami warning on her cellphone sent Rebecca Hart into action. Still clad in their bikinis, she and her 17-year-old daughter ended their Waikīkī vacation early and raced to the airport hoping to get home to Kauaʻi before the waves hit.

Hart was able to change their flights on Southwest Airlines from 8:45 p.m. to 5:15 p.m. Tuesday, which would get them back to the Garden Island well before the tsunami was predicted to land at 7:10 p.m. She ordered an Uber ride to Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport.

But the pair ended up stranded on the top floor of the airport’s parking garage with hundreds of other travelers. And although the tsunami triggered by an 8.8-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Russia left Hawaiʻi mostly unscathed, she said the communications failure she experienced at the hands of Honolulu Airport employees has left her unnerved.

“We were getting better updates by the teenagers on Instagram Live than the airport,” Hart said.

Hawaiʻi’s flagship airport was built in a low-lying coastal area that sits in a red zone on tsunami evacuation maps — the highest risk area that calls for immediate evacuation during most tsunami warnings. On the heels of a slew of flight cancellations, travelers were left confused, anxious and wondering if they were safe to wait around in an airport that many employees had already deserted.

Roughly 5,225 people spent the night at airports across the state Tuesday, including 2,000 people at Honolulu Airport, the Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation estimates.

“I assumed when we were coming into the airport we would have more information, but not a single person was providing info to us,” said Hart, who lives on Kauaʻi’s North Shore and coordinates health and wellness programming at an upscale hotel.

The transportation department’s director, Ed Sniffin, canceled a planned interview to discuss this story. Instead, agency spokesman Russell Pang said in an email that transportation officials offered travelers updates about the status of airport operations on social media in addition to general information relayed by other means.

Southwest Airlines emailed a statement from its communications office saying that airline workers were on hand to assist travelers at Honolulu Airport on Tuesday and that it had issued a travel advisory to help customers change their travel plans without paying additional fees.

At Maui’s Kahului Airport, which is also in a tsunami inundation zone, Pang said airport staff directed travelers to flee from the lower level of the airport and relocate to the second floor. That didn’t appear to be the case at Honolulu Airport, where Hart said she heard no loudspeaker announcements or verbal instructions to help her and hundreds of other confused travelers navigate the threat.

The Abandoned Ticket Counter

After a slogging journey on a traffic-clogged H-1 freeway, Hart and her daughter were still wearing their bikinis and beach coverups at about 4:20 p.m. when they were dropped off at the Terminal 2 departures lobby to check in for their flight to Kauaʻi. They hurried to the Southwest Airlines ticket counter only to find it was not staffed.

Hart said she waited at the ticket counter for 20 minutes before a ticket agent appeared. The agent explained she had been in a staff meeting and said if they hurried Hart and her daughter should be able to make it to the boarding gate before their flight’s scheduled departure.

Moments after Hart and her daughter got to the gate, the airline boarding agent’s two-way radio buzzed, rendering their fate: All Southwest Airlines flights had been grounded. 

With the possibility of a dangerous wave on its way, Hart knew she and her daughter needed to seek higher ground — but where? At the Terminal 2 departures lobby, she heard no loudspeaker notifications, no verbal instructions and airport staff were scarce.

Evacuating the airport didn’t seem plausible, either. The Uber app on Hart’s phone wasn’t turning up any rides. A sense of eeriness hung over the departures terminal where restaurants and kiosks had already closed.

“There wasn’t really anybody around to ask anything to,” Hart said, adding, “This was super scary and unsettling. As a mom I had to take deep breaths, stay calm and try to make the best decision.”

In an airport restroom where Hart and her daughter tucked inside to change out of their beach clothes, they met a janitor who suggested they seek shelter on the top floor of the parking garage.

When they got to the garage, not many other travelers were there. But by about 6:30 p.m., Hart said roughly 250 people had gathered. Hart and her daughter sat on the bare concrete with little to do but wait.

Kailani, 17, filmed dance videos for TikTok. Hart stared at her cellphone, relying on social media posts from friends for tsunami updates. A Southwest Airlines crew brought out complimentary snacks and water.

By 11 p.m., Hart said she figured the threat of the tsunami had passed. The adrenaline had worn off. She was tired and uncomfortable from laying on the concrete floor. Uber had no rides available so she downloaded the Lyft app and booked a ride back to Waikīkī. The first few hotels she called had no vacancy but she eventually found a room at The Polynesian Residences Waikīkī Beach. It was just before midnight when the mother-daughter duo collapsed in their hotel beds.

They flew back to Kauaʻi without incident on Wednesday, a sour end to their playful excursion to celebrate the last stretch of school-free summer.