Q&A: Haa Keaulana wants to change how people think about Hawaii

The photography of Haa Keaulana, granddaughter of Oahu surf legend Buffalo Keaulana, has a worldwide audience.

Hawaii Magazine Nov 6, 2017

If you don’t already know surfer-photographer-model Haa Keaulana, you will soon enough. With more than 140,000 Instagram followers, the 25-year-old Keaulana has been sharing colorful lifestyle surf photography of her hometown of Makaha with the world. It’s led to partnerships with several companies, including the Four Seasons Resort Ko Olina, OluKai and Hawaiian Airlines. Our older, sunbaked readers may also recognize her family name: The patriarch of the family is her grandfather, Richard “Buffalo” Keaulana, who was a famous Waikiki beachboy, lifeguard, big-wave surfer and inaugural Hokulea voyage crewman. Haa continues the ocean-centered legacy her family has established, and she’s sharing it with the world, pic by pic, like by like, follower by follower. 

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Wyatt Werneth Has Committed Entire Life to Ocean Safety And Will Be Honored With Space Coast Public Service Lifetime Achievement Award

Space Coast Daily August 27, 2017

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA – Wyatt Werneth began his career in 1994 after serving an eight year commitment with the U.S. Navy.

While in college, Werneth started his own diving business where he met a volunteer firefighter from the Cape Canaveral Volunteer Fire Department.

He then joined the Cape Canaveral Volunteer Fire Department, and he also tried out for a Brevard County lifeguard position.

It didn’t take long before Werneth was improving his skill set by attending Fire College and EMT school to become a better lifesaver.

Lifeguarding came natural for him, and he excelled in rank very quickly. His first year he became a Lieutenant and the following year a Captain running his own lifeguard team.

In 1996, the Cape Canaveral Volunteer Fire Department requested that the Fire Department manage the lifeguards.

Werneth jumped at the opportunity to go full-time with the Fire Department and by 1997, the Fire Department had successfully formed a lifeguard division of the fire department with Werneth in command.

Before the year ended, Cape Canaveral lifeguards had been certified as an advanced certified life-saving organization. The very first year, the lifeguards proved invaluable by making a rescue, which earned Werneth and the team EMT of the Year.

He implemented many improvements such as the first defibrillator and rescue watercraft at Jetty Park.

Werneth accepted the position as Brevard County Ocean Rescue Chief in 1999, where he established the first Brevard County ocean rescue rookie class to recognize all lifeguards.

In 2004, he joined the U.S. Coast Guard and soon after, became a naval officer for the Navy Sea Cadet Corp as a special warfare orientation course instructor.

In 2007, Brevard County experienced 10 drownings in a short period of time. To help raise awareness, he decided he would paddle board up the coast of Florida for 10 days to raise awareness.

The 345 mile trip from the Miami Beach lifeguard station, up the coast to the Jacksonville lifeguard station, set a Guinness world record.

He is currently working with other lifeguards to form a non-profit organization called the Life Rescue Project. Their mission is to implement life safety devices along all beaches in areas where there are no lifeguards.

Werneth has since retired, but remains active in water safety as an active rescuer with the Melbourne Beach and Satellite Beach Volunteer Fire Department’s water rescue teams, as well as being instrumental in discussions of a Brevard County Sheriff’s Office Aviation Rescue Swimmer team.

He has committed his entire life to ocean safety and continues with his life-saving legacy to inspire ocean rescuers everywhere.

HAWAIIAN WATER PATROL ALL GROWN UP - Watercraft Journal

 

The Hawaiian Water Patrol (HWP) was founded by former Honolulu City and County lifeguards Terry Ahue and Brian Keaulana. What started out as a couple of guys on jet skis performing rogue water rescues, finally became a legal entity in the mid 1990’s. This was after scores of tickets were issued to Keaulana for launching his jet-ski. It didn’t matter that he had saved lives while off the Hawaiian Islands.

Ahue and Keaulana realized that they should engage in putting together a book of professional guidelines and standards. Prior to becoming an official organization the two men purchased a couple of skis and brought some other skilled lifeguards on board to run rescue at professional surfing events. Soon after, they built a rescue sled for transporting surfers and victims of water related incidents to safety. This method cut down on the amount of time it took to safely bring someone in from a dangerous situation.

The HWP was soon hailed as the top dog of water rescue and Hollywood approached them for stunt and safety coordination. The lifesavers even became members of the Stunt and Screen Actors Guild and that’s when their operation turned into a money maker!

According to a recent piece on surfline.com, Ahue and Keaulana became certified Hollywood stunt and safety coordinators. Technically, the group operates as “Ocean Risk and Management”, a subcontracted private business hired for any water event, film, or surf contest. The Hawaiian Water Patrol has come a long way since its rogue rescue days! The crew is always learning and staying up to date with and creating the latest rescue techniques. Like a fine wine, it gets better with age.

Shared from the Watercraft Journal

A Canadian just reached the Alaska coast after swimming by riverboard nearly 2,000 miles down the Yukon River

Denis Morin swam, with a riverboard, from Whitehorse, Yukon, to Emmonak, Alaska, near the Bering Sea, between May 25 and Aug. 9, 2016. (Denis Morin) 

A few days ago, at the end of a summerlong journey in which he navigated nearly the entire Yukon River without a boat, Denis Morin was overcome by all he was and all he had been through.

The French-Canadian traveled the river from Whitehorse, Yukon, to the mouth in Alaska by riverboard. The bright blue board is a little more than half his height in length, and looks something like a boogie board with sides. He kicked and sometimes stroked for almost 2,000 miles. He encountered big rain and hail, headwinds and whitecaps, two grizzly bears and an errant salmon.

And he did it alone.

Morin, 54, calls himself a swimmer. More precisely, he is a riverboarder, an athlete in an emerging sport of swimming aided by a floatation board and fins. Thousands of people around the world do it, said Morin, who is part of the World Riverboarding Association. Most are thrill-seekers in whitewater with extra protective gear. The Yukon was for distance.

After 75 days and almost 2,000 miles, on Tuesday he rose out of a slough at his destination: the Southwest Alaska fishing village of Emmonak, near the Bering Sea at one of the Yukon's mouths.

There, local salmon roe man Jim Friedman heard that a stranger had just arrived. He went to the dock by the fish plant to see if the man needed help.

"Where's your canoe?" Friedman asked.

Don't have one, Morin answered.

"Where's your kayak then?"

Morin didn't have one of those, either.

"Then how'd ya get here?" Friedman wondered.

"I swam," Morin told him.

A first for the Yukon

Canoeists, rafters and other explorers have tackled the Yukon before. But residents of river villages say they don't know of anyone else who traveled Alaska's longest river without a boat or paddle.

Denis Morin swam, with a riverboard, from Whitehorse, Yukon, to Emmonak, Alaska, between May 25 and Aug. 9 2016. This image is made from a GoPro mounted to his cargo. As Morin swam the upper reaches of the Yukon River, he towed his camp, food and other supplies. (Denis Morin)

Anchorage Daily News Author: Lisa Demer

Read more; http://www.adn.com/outdoors-adventure/2016/08/12/a-canadian-just-reached-the-alaska-coast-after-swimming-by-riverboard-nearly-2000-miles-down-the-yukon-river/

Mick Fanning Awarded SIMA’s 2016 Waterman of the Year Honor

What more can we say about Mick Fanning that hasn’t already been said in the past 12 months? The world watched him escape an encounter with a shark mid-heat and never looked away – from losing his brother during a week that decided the world title, to his triumphant climb into the title race to begin with – just about everything Mick experienced in a very public light had to tug at your heart strings. Then he announced early in 2016 it had all added up to taking a much deserved year off from competition. Inevitably, the world still pulls for Mick, even if he’s not going to wear a jersey most of 2016.

Come August, Mick will be honored in Laguna Beach, California as the 2016 Waterman of the Year for SIMA’s 27th Annual Waterman’s Weekend.

“Mick has overcome some major hurdles in his life while working his way to the top of the sport” reads a press release announcing the honor. “From personal losses to suffering a complete hamstring tear in 2004 that sidelined him for six months. Then in 2015, while battling for a fourth world title, Mick infamously battled a shark in a heat during the J-Bay Open. Throughout it all, Mick has always shown the heart of a champion and represented surfing in the most positive way.”

Fanning joins a list that includes last year’s Waterman of the Year honoree, Stephanie Gilmore, as well as legends like Tom Carroll Tom Curren, Andy Irons, Gerry Lopez and Bruce Brown, to name a few.

Also being honored during the 27th Annual Waterman’s Weekend are big wave surfer Ramon Navarro as the 2016 Environmentalist of the Year, with the Lifetime Achievement Award going to Simon Anderson. The two-day fundraising event is expected to will support the SIMA Environmental Fund. The Waterman’s Ball itself attracts more than 600 people each year as is expected to raise close to $400,000 to benefit 18 different ocean conservation groups.

The Vendée Globe, 100 days and counting!

This Friday 29 July, there are exactly 100 days until the start of the eighth Vendée Globe, which will set sail from Les Sables d'Olonne on France’s Atlantic seaboard on 6 November at 13:02pm local time. Thirty sailors have signed up for this eighth edition, 28 of whom have already qualified. We get the low-down.

As 13:02pm French time ticks by this Friday, we’ll be down to just double figures to indicate the number of days until the start of the upcoming Vendée Globe. Less than 100 days to go then. Fourteen weeks and forty-eight hours, a mere drop in the ocean in relation to the four years between each edition. If a number of the skippers are allowing themselves a few days’ respite this summer, it’s also because they know that it’s the last opportunity to take some time out before the final rush for the start. Indeed, September will be very hectic with the sailors obliged to be present in Les Sables d’Olonne with their boats on the eve of the opening of the race village, which equates to a noon deadline on 14 October 2016 at the latest.

Dates to remember:
. 8 and 9 September: Skippers’ briefings
. 14 September: Press Conference in Paris
. 14 October: Presence of the skippers and boats in Les Sables d'Olonne
. 15 October: Official opening of the Village in Les Sables d'Olonne
. 6 November: Start of the Vendée Globe
. 7 November: Opening of Race HQ in Paris

More information