February-March 2006: Heavy rain begins falling seven weeks before the dam breach. During those 42 days, 111 flash flood warnings are issued for locations in Hawai'i.

March 14: A 200-foot-wide breach of the earthen dam before dawn unleashes almost 400 million gallons of water in the worst natural disaster on Kaua'i since Hurricane 'Iniki in 1992. The flash flood uproots homes, explodes power transformers and leaves dozens of trees bobbing in the ocean. Seven people die.

March 15: Kaua'i County launches an investigation into whether homes and other structures lost in the flood were properly permitted and were built outside the flood zone.

March 16: State attorney general's office opens a broad investigation into the collapse. The office issues subpoenas to the Mary N. Lucas Trust and retired car dealer Jimmy Pflueger, owners of the land on which Kaloko Reservoir sits.

March 17: Gov. Linda Lingle asks the Legislature for an emergency dispersal of $14.3 million to cover the cost of storm recovery. A computer model shows that as the water roared through the steep valley, it was 20 feet deep and moving at up to 20 mph. Where the land flattens, the flood broadened, thinned to 10 feet and slowed to 10 mph. After it crossed Kuhio Highway, it picked up speed and depth.

March 19: A memorial service is held for the victims: Aurora Fehring, 24; her husband, Alan Dingwall, 30; the couple's child, 2-year-old Rowan Fehring-Dingwall; Christina Macnees, 22; Macnees' fiance, Daniel Arroyo, 33; Wayne Rotstein, 49; and Timothy Noonan, 37. All seven had been sleeping in houses on the Fehring property that were washed away.

March 20: Engineers launch an unprecedented inspection of Kaua'i's 54 reservoir dams, going in by foot, four-wheel-drive and helicopter.

March 24: State and federal crews use radar surveying equipment to map Kaloko Dam — including an area described as its spillway. The spillway — and whether it has been altered — emerges as a central issue.

A damage assessment finds that more than 50 homes on Kaua'i suffered damage as a result of the rain and dam breach. Of those, two were destroyed and four sustained major damage.

May 2: President Bush declares a major disaster in the spring floods, which qualifies Hawai'i for federal disaster relief. The state estimates that damage from the dam failure and severe flooding on Kaua'i and O'ahu could exceed $50 million.

May 10: Disclosed records show a joint state-federal report issued in 1984 identified problems with the structural stability of Kaloko Dam and estimated the cost of repairs at $1.9 million. No records have been found that show repairs or any other follow-up were conducted.

Jan. 9, 2007: An independent civil probe into the Kaloko Dam disaster concludes that the dam probably failed because its emergency spillway had been covered. In late 1997 or early 1998, the report stated, "earth was moved into the emergency spillway. ... A number of members of the community were aware the emergency spillway had been covered." Kaua'i County cited Pflueger in 1997 for a grading violation after investigating a report of extensive grading next to the reservoir. In one of the regulatory failures cited in the report, it says then-Mayor Maryanne Kusaka ordered her engineers to "stop all actions involving Mr. Pflueger." Kusaka has since said she was trying to avoid wasting time on anonymous complaints, even though in this case the complaint already had been confirmed by an on-site investigation. Years later, when U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, state Department of Health and county planning and engineering inspectors investigated the grading violations, no one appeared to have noticed the missing emergency spillway.