Dozens of ships headed to open water, 40,000 to 50,000 locals and tourists scrambled to safety and high ground, and communities from Hilo to Waikīkī transformed into instant ghost towns yesterday as the Islands braced for a tsunami that rolled in as merely an odd ocean surge.

Something of a historic moment may have occurred at 9:01 a.m. Friday when John Tabangcura with the Parks and Recreations Department pulled his city refuse truck up to a hardscrabble homeless area variously known as "the wild west" on the Wai'anae Coast and began loading piles of rubbish off state-owned Farrington Highway.

A $316 million project to renovate the state's large public housing property and add affordable and market-rent units at Kuhio Park Terrace is moving ahead, with a development company taking out a $1.7 million loan with the state to help cover planning and design costs.