Posted on: Monday, November 5, 2001

Tugs will do hula at harbor festival

By Karen Blakeman
Advertiser Staff Writer

Some things only happen once in a lifetime.

Not so the Honolulu Harbor Festival and its most crowd-pleasing event, the tugboat hula. Those who missed it last year will get another chance at the 2nd annual Honolulu Harbor Festival.

The festival takes place between Aloha Tower Marketplace and the Hawai'i Maritime Museum from 10 a.m through 4 p.m Nov. 11.

In addition to the tugboat hula contest, the festival offers a Coast Guard Search and Rescue demonstration, ship tours, a keiki treasure hunt and tours of the harbor.

A new event, the first annual Sand Island canoe race, is expected to feature more than 20 canoes, said Brian Taylor, president of this year's festival and general manager of CSX Lines, a container shipping company.

The tugboat hula, a first-of- its-kind event last year and possibly the only hula contest ever to be preformed by tugboats, is expected to be even better this year, Taylor said. Once again, it will feature entries from Sause Bros. Ocean Towing Co. and Hawaiian Tug & Barge, renown rivals in the world of tugboat hula.

The tugs have had a year to practice hull swaying and fantail swooshing and their handlers have had a chance to learn from their mistakes.

Hawaiian Tug & Barge now realizes, for example, that when dancing tugs are trying to synchronize movements, it helps if they have similarly responsive controls, said Glenn Hong, the company's president.

This year, Hong said, Hawaiian Tug & Barge will rely on its top hula dancing tug, Mamo. He refused to provide information about Mamo's planned routine.

"No details,'' he said. "It's like talking to the Pentagon."

But the company executive did have a promise to make.

"The tugboat hula will be a really enjoyable, entertaining part of the program," he said.