A 67-year-old Keauhou man died Wednesday after the double hull canoe he was in flipped.
Kona police responded to the Keauhou pier at about 7 a.m. All 10 paddlers from the canoe were back on shore by 7:45 a.m. Witnesses say high surf had dropped over-night.
"Got caught by a rogue wave and flipped the boat. We don’t know if it totally flipped it or if it just went up vertical and catapulted them out or exactly what occurred," said Bill Armer of the Keauhou Canoe Club. "It’s highly irregular very unusual just does not happen in paddling. That we lose somebody in the act of paddling and that’s what occurred today and it’s a very hard blow for us it’s a very hard blow for the paddling world."
The man who was a recreational paddler with the Keahou Canoe Club was taken to Kona Community Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. His identity has not been released.
See the original article at: KHON2 Developing Stories
