Surf champ hauls in odd prize
By Will Hoover
Advertiser Leeward O'ahu Writer
Just back from competing in the Oxbow World Longboard Championship in Mexico, three-time world longboarding champion Rusty Keaulana inadvertently got involved yesterday in what he called a whole new event: ocean pig hunting.
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"This is more exciting than Mexico," Keaulana said, shortly after hauling a 180-pound wild boar in from the waves off Makua beach. "I'm still in shock. This is like winning the world title — only I won a pig!"
Pig fishermen, from left, Chris Hinojosa, Rusty Keaulana, Shane Delos Santos and Bruce Florence display the catch of the day: a 180-pound wild boar seen floundering offshore. They believe it may have been chased off a cliff at Makua.
Keaulana said he was relaxing with his son at Makaha Beach at about 9:30 a.m. when a couple of acquaintances from Wai'anae ran up and told him they had just seen a wild pig jump into the ocean near Makua Ranch.
The men guessed the animal had been chased from the hills by dogs. The pig swam about a mile out, where it encountered a 14-foot white Boston Whaler that began herding the animal to shore.
Keaulana and two friends, Bruce Florence and Shane Delos Santos, headed for Makua beach to investigate. Florence and Delos Santos dived into the water and swam toward the pig.
They had second thoughts when they reached the animal and it turned aggressive.
"I'm a hunter," Florence said. "I've hunted pigs all my life. I was thinking, I'm not scared of this boar. But when I got about three feet from the pig, he looked me straight in the eye and — whoa! — I just back-pedaled. This guy was steaming hot. I was so scared I thought, Oh no, I'm not doing this."
Florence and Delos Santos swam back toward the beach. Keaulana dived into the water with a line, when the animal stopped moving about 30 yards off shore.
"I threw a line around him, tied him up and brought him in," Keaulana said. "He had drowned swimming. It was really tough to drag him through the waves. This thing was big. His tusks are a good three inches."
The three put the dead pig in Keaulana's pickup and made plans for a barbecue.
Then Keaulana called his mom and told her he was bringing a pig home from the beach.
"We've took pictures of it on my tailgate," he said. "I want to show them to the TV fishing guy Mike Sakamoto and say, Look what we caught."
