Hawai'i plans to spend at least $14 million in the next two years to reduce the risk of rockslides, making the Islands one of the hot spots for projects to remove rockfall dangers.

The planned spending amounts to almost as much as has been spent by the state since 2003 — approximately $17.1 million — the year state officials first aggressively began addressing the problem.

Eric Hirano, chief engineer for the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, said some high-profile incidents spurred action four years ago.

"It wasn't until the high-profile projects like Sacred Falls, the Waimea Bay rockfall and the Onishi rockfall in Nu'uanu that killed that poor girl," Hirano said. "The public is now more aware of these rockfall incidents and they're beginning to report them more and bring them to our attention. It's basically increased from 2003 to now. But it's going to be an ongoing budget issue from now."

And an expensive one.

DLNR's current budget includes $2 million to make Diamond Head safer from rockfall dangers. But the latest estimate to do the work correctly has risen to $6 million.

"Because we only have $2 million, that limits which rockfall projects we can address," he said.

The quickened pace of new projects follows decades of hillside neglect in the Islands, said Cliff Tillotson, vice president of Santa Barbara, Calif.-based Prometheus Construction, which has had a full-time office in Kane'ohe since 2002.

"Before, Hawai'i was like an ostrich with its head in the sand," Tillotson said. "Now the problems are finally being addressed."

State, federal and county officials, private developers and homeowners' associations are now "catching up on the things they weren't doing for a long time," Tillotson said.

Hawai'i is one of the "big states" when it comes to rockslide spending, along with Colorado, Washington and California, Tillotson said.

But unlike Mainland states, Hawai'i has specific issues that drive up costs about 20 percent, including the Islands' lava-based geology, which requires special training and techniques, and more expensive materials needed to ward off corrosion, along with the extra costs to ship material from the Mainland.

Many of the issues are evident in the efforts to clear the hillside above Waimea Bay, the scene of a 2000 rockslide that shut down the North Shore for 95 days.

After state officials rerouted Kamehameha Highway and installed metal safety fences, another rockslide hit the same area in April, once again cutting off access through the North Shore.

"We're dealing with a more unstable situation than we anticipated," said Chris Ingram, president of Oregon-based Hi-Tech Rockfall Construction Inc., which has the $151,000 contract for the project. "And it's very dangerous work as you can see."

WORKER HIT IN HEAD

A four-person crew from Hi-Tech Rockfall Construction was removing material from the hillside last week when one of the workers was hit in the head by a rock the size of a softball that blew out of the hillside.

James Baynes, a 24-year-old rockfall worker, suffered a 2-inch gash behind his head when a "non-explosive boulder buster" launched the 6-inch diameter rock from the Waimea Bay hillside into his head.

His injury prompted an investigation by the state Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, which found no fault and characterized the incident as a "freak accident."

Even as state investigators searched for the cause of the accident, Hi-Tech Rockfall workers on Wednesday discovered even more work to be done.

Illustrating the ramp-up in state activity, two Mainland companies and one based in Canada have set up full-time offices on O'ahu within the past five years, after the 2002 death of 25-year-old Dara Onishi, who was killed when a 5-ton boulder crashed into her Nu'uanu bedroom as she slept.

'A LOT OF WORK'

Onishi's death was after the 1999 Mother's Day rockslide that left eight people dead and 50 hurt when tons of boulders crashed into the pool below Sacred Falls.

On Thanksgiving Day 2002, two boulders the size of garbage Dumpsters rumbled down from the hillside above the Lalea condominium in Hawai'i Kai, forcing the evacuation of 26 families for 11 months.

"There is a lot of work coming up in Hawai'i because of all of the rockfall problems," said Daniel Journeaux, president and owner of Quebec-based Janod Inc., which has had a full-time office in Honolulu for the past three years. "For such a small state, Hawai'i is definitely a hot market."

Hawai'i's problems first piqued Journeaux's interest six years ago, when he began noticing more and more news stories "where there were fatalities and rockfall problems. They were getting more and more consistent."

Janod has completed about a dozen private and public rockfall projects on O'ahu, Kaua'i and Maui.

Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com.