Fatal crash renews calls for highway improvement
By Karen Blakeman and Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer
A 62-year-old Waimanalo man died after a collision early yesterday morning at nearly the same location near Olomana Golf Course on Kalaniana'ole Highway as a similar crash two years ago.
Yesterday's crash triggered renewed calls for safety improvements along that stretch of the highway.
Ramus Seabury was driving a truck that was hit by another truck that drifted across Kalaniana'ole Highway.
Ramus Seabury, who was pronounced dead at Castle Medical Center, was driving a truck that was hit by another truck that drifted across the highway, according to police.
The driver of the other truck, a Nissan, was a 19-year-old man from the Kailua area. He and his 19-year-old passenger, another Waimanalo man, were also taken to Castle.
The two 19-year-olds were treated and released. A negligent homicide case has been opened.
The Seabury family knows the family of the driver of the Nissan, and members of both families were at the hospital yesterday. Seabury's son, Kekai, 32, said the father of the teenager who drove the Nissan had been Ramus Seabury's golfing buddy.
"He broke down and cried," Kekai Seabury said about the teenager's father. "He told me he was sorry. I told him, 'It's not your fault.' "
The 4:31 a.m. crash yesterday occurred near the scene of a similar fatal accident on Kalaniana'ole Highway at 5:25 a.m. on Jan. 2, 2001, when Lorrie-Ann Wiley, 32, was killed.
Both cases involved victims who were fatally injured when hit by vehicles that crossed over into the Kailua-bound lane at a point where the highway narrows from four lanes to two.
Seabury's wife Harriet yesterday said she hoped something would be done about what she and other community members say is a dangerous stretch of highway. "We've got to do something," she said. "We've got to stop killing each other here in Waimanalo."
Wilson Kekoa Ho, chairman of the Waimanalo Neighborhood Board, yesterday said the state should put a median strip on the highway to prevent drivers from drifting into oncoming traffic and killing innocent victims.
"There have been too many deaths," Ho said. "If a median strip had been put in 10 years ago, it would have saved five lives. And these are our people, from our community."
Ho said the collision involving Seabury was 15 yards from that involving Wiley.
The exact cause of yesterday's death will not be known until an autopsy is performed.
In both cases, the victims had to be pried from their cars by Honolulu Fire Department crews.
Police said alcohol on the part of the surviving driver may have been a factor yesterday, as it was in the 2001 case, and speed may also have been a factor yesterday.
Ramus Seabury was headed toward Kailua driving a 1991 blue pickup truck when it was hit by the 2001 red Nissan pickup. The Nissan "veered left into the northbound (Kailua-bound) lane" and hit the other truck, Vehicular Homicide Section Sgt. Alan Vegas said.
Harriet Seabury said before her husband left for his part-time job at the golf course at Kane'ohe's Marine Corps Base Hawai'i, he had leaned across the bed in his Waimanalo home and kissed her and their sleeping great-grand daughter goodbye.
She said she rubbed his head and told him that she loved him.
Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser
Meanwhile, Kekai Seabury had also left for work, came to the scene of the crash and realized that his father was a victim. The son said he was trying to hug his dying father through the crumpled wreckage and trying, but failing, to understand his last murmured words.
Harriet Seabury, center, is surrounded by her grandchildren and holds her great-grandchild. Her husband, Ramus, was killed in an auto accident yesterday morning on Kalaniana'ole Highway.
Harriet Seabury prayed the accident wasn't as bad as it sounded, but when she got there she could see her husband's 1991 pickup truck crumpled and pushed halfway over the guard rail.
"I wanted to go to my husband," she said. "But they wouldn't let me."
Harriet Seabury said word had spread through Waimanalo where her husband spent most of his life. "He was so loved," she said. "Everyone has been coming, bringing food."
Ramus Seabury, who was retired from Hawaiian Dredging, had coached little league sports for years. "He was funny and witty," Harriet said. "He'd touched a lot of people's lives.
In the 2001 crash, the driver in the 2001 case, Kam K. Williams, now 21, was sentenced last month to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter. Williams caused Wiley's death when he collided head-on with her car.
Williams had been drinking with friends at a nightclub until 4 a.m. and was driving a friend's car home when he apparently fell asleep, allowing the car to drift across the center line and collide with a car driven by Wiley, Williams' lawyer said during the court proceedings.
After Wiley's death, the state Department of Transportation agreed to put rumble strips on the highway. Transportation officials could not be reached for comment yesterday.
"People say the rumble strips are annoying, but if it saves one life, if it wakes someone up coming home late from a disco and helps avoid a head-on collision, it will be worth it," Waimanalo Neighborhood Board member Andrew Jamila Jr. said at the time.
Neighborhood Board Chairman Ho said yesterday the fatality was another consequence of Waimanalo's lack of political influence. "Waimanalo, demographically, is not a place where the state rushes to solve problems," he said.
"Two years ago, we wanted lights, flashing lights, to let people know there was a turn coming up and a change from four lanes to two.
"The speed limit on the highway (as it heads toward Waimanalo) drops from 45 to 35 to 25 miles an hour in a very short distance, and the character of the roadway changes from a four-lane highway to a two-lane road," he said.
