Victim's mother wants blowhole grate

By Mike Gordon
Advertiser Staff Writer

There have been days when grief overwhelmed her, when she had no way to cope except by crying, but now Nancy Dick has a mission.

Daniel Dick, who was killed at the Halona Blowhole in July, is shown in this 2000 photo with his mother, Nancy, and brothers Matthew, second from right, and Jacob. Dick family photo

The 47-year-old hairdresser from Sylmar, Calif., understands that a steel grate is an extreme idea but said her 18-year-old son's memory demands nothing less.

"I would think that people would be happy that maybe a life would be saved," she said by telephone from Barbara's Hair Company in Sylmar.

She said the pain of Daniel's June 30 death was beyond anything she and her two other sons — Jacob, 16, and Matthew, 15 — could imagine.

Daniel was "the glue" that held family and friends together, his mother said.

Classmates were always eating meals at his house, girls were always calling for his advice on their boyfriends, and troubled teens Daniel barely knew seemed to always befriend him and get help.

"He was a deep thinker," Nancy Dick said. "And he was always thinking about other people. He never went through that selfish teenage thing."

At the Ralphs supermarket where the teenager was a bag boy, the manager turned a checkout stand into a shrine with candles and flowers and a photograph of Daniel. Customers left a slew of sympathy notes.

More than 1,000 people showed up for his memorial service.

The trip to O'ahu had been the family's annual vacation. Nancy Dick, a divorced mother for 12 years, saved for an entire year to pay for it.

"Every summer I took my boys on awesome trips," she said. "We have traveled all over the western United States together. Just the four of us, always."

Daniel had just graduated from First Lutheran High School, where he was student-body president. He was going to attend community college in the fall to study business.

He and his brothers had never been to Hawai'i.

On the day he died, Daniel was at Sandy Beach with a girl.

According to witnesses, Daniel walked up to the blowhole from Sandy Beach and may not have known of the area's hazardous conditions.

At the blowhole, he leaned over the opening, forming a bridge with his body. About 30 seconds later, a geyser of water shot through the hole, catching him square in the chest and sending him 8 to 12 feet into the air. He somersaulted and disappeared head-first into the blowhole.

Police found Nancy Dick and her other sons at their hotel and brought them to the blowhole to wait.

"It was just sick and gut-wrenching," she said.

When firefighters suspended their search that night, she was going to stay until they returned at first light. She said she asked them: What if he comes up through the hole and he can't get out by himself?

"That's when they told me 'That isn't going to happen,' " she said. "That was a real reality check for me and we went back home to the hotel and I don't remember us saying very much. We took showers and cried a lot."

Divers found Daniel Dick the next morning not far from the underwater entrance to the blowhole.

The idea for a grate came to Nancy Dick a few days later. It needs to be simple and sturdy, she said.

"I am looking at it from such a practical point of view," she said. "I don't think people would see it, but if you did, so what?"

She explained her views in a letter to Gov. Ben Cayetano, who then ordered the state Department of Land and Natural Resources to see what could be done to prevent similar accidents.

"It's not as simple as people think," said Gilbert Coloma-Agaran, director of the land use agency. "You're talking about making a man-made change to a natural feature. If it makes sense to do, we will work with whomever we need to work with."

Coloma-Agaran said he has no idea how long it will take to make a recommendation on Dick's proposal, but he will discuss it with the governor.

Nancy Dick said she will push the state as hard as she can.

David Dick, her ex-husband, filed a lawsuit in Circuit Court in Honolulu Aug. 9 against the city and the state. He is seeking unspecified damages due to alleged negligence over the failure to post warning signs from Sandy Beach. He said he isn't sure if a steel grate is the right solution.

"I am not an expert on safety, but obviously there needs to be something done," David Dick said by telephone from California. "I don't know what. I am not an engineer."

Nancy Dick said she has never been a part of the lawsuit and does not support it. "I don't agree with what he's doing," she said.

In the first few weeks after her son died, Dick said she greeted the end of every day with a sense of relief. As a Christian, she believes she will see her son again in heaven.

Daniel is still the first thing she thinks of in the morning and the last thing on her mind when she falls asleep.

"It's going to get better," she said. "I am going to get to the point, I know, when I stop thinking about the sadness of the whole thing."

Reach Mike Gordon at mgordon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8012.