Aikau Big-Wave Event Lives Up to Its Name

The mammoth swell that forecasters said would slam into Oahu’s north-facing coastline Wednesday in the early-morning darkness did so with the subtlety of bombshells.

Waves boomed over the reefs with earth-shaking force and made sleep nearly impossible for surfers on call for the $112,000 Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau Big-Wave Invitational.

“I didn’t sleep very well at all. I was rolling around and up every hour,” Ross Clarke-Jones, 38, from Bells Beach, Australia, said after surfing his final heat to lead by one point, only to be edged by Bruce Irons of Kauai.

The 24 surfers, hand-picked experts from around the world, rose Wednesday morning to find most of the popular beaches closed because of hazardous conditions.

But at renowned Waimea Bay, which can handle the larger swells, conditions were deemed ideal for an event held only in years in which extreme becomes the operative word -- as a way of paying homage to legendary North Shore lifeguard Eddie Aikau, who died while attempting an offshore rescue in 1978.

Thousands of spectators lined the bay’s fringes and jammed the main highway in parked cars to witness the seventh running of “the Eddie,” as it has come to be known -- and to witness what many consider sheer lunacy on the part of otherwise rational human beings.

Though Hawaiian measurements are from the backs of waves and organizers were calling them 20- to 25-footers, the faces of some measured 50-plus feet, their riders mere specks on drawn-out green walls breaking thunderously under a bright blue sky.

The most minuscule of all, Darryl “Flea” Virostko, was credited with the day’s best wipeout, after free-falling down a 40-foot face and having his board snapped like kindling.

Surfers were given scores between one and 20 by five judges and allowed to surf two heats, catching as many as eight waves. They were allowed to keep the cumulative scores of their four top waves.

Irons, brother of the Assn. of Surfing Professionals’ world champion, Andy Irons, held the lead after the first of two rounds, thanks to the day’s only 100-point score.

Clarke-Jones opened a one-point lead after his second heat, meaning Irons needed to replace one of his scores to prevail. After suffering a wipeout in which “my nose filled with water and my eyelids peeled back,” he managed to post a 99 and emerged triumphant -- and $55,000 richer -- in his first Eddie after several years on the alternate list. Shane Dorian of Kailua-Kona on neighboring Hawaii finished third.

“It’s been a dream since I was little,” said Bruce Irons, 25, adding that the spirit of Aikau “still runs through the valleys.”

Aikau was a regular on big days at Waimea, when he wasn’t on lifeguard duty. He was presumed drowned in 1978 after a 60-foot ocean canoe he and 15 others were on capsized in the dark in gale-force winds in the Molokai Channel.

Signal flares were fired through the night, yet there was no sign of help come morning. Clinging to the hull of the vessel and drifting to sea, the group voted that the best chance for survival was to send someone toward land aboard a 10-foot surfboard. Aikau volunteered and was never seen again.

Thomas reported from Los Angeles.