Not a good day

It's back on the mountain tomorrow and despite the summit weather forecast, which has been calling for fog and rain up there due to Tropical Depression Felicia, so far the sky has been clear and conditions excellent. It's incredible to think that just a few days ago Felicia was a category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale (just one below the maximum of 5) with the eye forecast to pass right over my house! OK, so it wasn't forecast to be such a large hurricane by the time it hit the islands, but just three or four days ago the forecast was giving equal probabilities to the storm being a hurricane, a tropical storm or tropical depression, so tensions were a little higher than normal with no one really knowing what to expect. In the end it's going to bring a little more rain than normal to Maui, Oahu and possibly Kauai and we're still to see the effects at Mauna Kea's summit. The surf here was impressive though but even that has gone.

Today at work we were all called to the staff lounge at 3pm. Usually this is for a celebration and donuts, perhaps for someone's birthday or a new hire. This time the announcement was different, it usually is a "will you join us in the staff lounge" but this was "please report to the staff lounge" and I knew something was up. When we were all there we were told that a work colleague had passed away. As you might imagine this was a terrible shock to everyone. Staff were allowed to leave early if they wanted and I know I went back to my office and couldn't do a thing, just stare at the computer screen while trying to comprehend what we'd all been told.

I'll be off to the summit with a very heavy heart.