Save Ma'alaea

The Maui Chapter has spear-headed the grass-roots initiative to influence a positive outcome at Ma’alaea – one that preserves coral, saves waves and the last remnant of the canoe-launching beach, while addressing harbor entrance navigation and safety. Surfrider is conducting an independent review of the US Army Corps of Engineers’ plan to expand Ma’alaea Harbor. Keep an eye out for the Surfrider Survey of harbor stakeholders – to be implemented this summer to canoe paddlers, fishers, boaters, divers, commercial operators, residents, and surfers.

The Maui Chapter grows stronger and more effective through its membership, and your membership might mean the difference in whether the US Army Corps of Engineers succeeds in constructing its 1968 plan that calls for the destruction of 4.8 acres of coral and disturbance of the critical habitat of endangered whales and turtles. The USACE plan will pave over small beach that has historic relevance and cultural significance, as it adds 620’ to the south breakwall – the length of two football fields. The goal of Surfrider Maui is to build community consensus on a locally preferred plan.

Your membership to the Surfrider Foundation will help strengthen the chances for a positive outcome at Ma'alaea. Join online with check or credit card at www.surfrider.org or call 1-800-743-SURF.

Ma’alaea Harbor – the skinny

By Lucienne DeNaie

Ma'alaea Harbor is a quaint little South seas port famed for both its winter population of visiting whales and the legendary Ma'alaea Pipeline wave. When a robust South swell hits Maui, surfers from far and near head for Ma'alaea to experience the tubular perfection of one of the world's fastest rideable waves.

The waters and reefs of Ma'alaea are important to many species. Ma'alaea Bay is part of the National Humpback Whale Marine Sanctuary - a favorite mating and birthing grounds for the endangered Humpbacks. Friendly Green Sea Turtles browse reefs that border the harbor entrance. Over one hundred species of fish and other marine life make those same reefs their home.

Ma'alaea is also a people place. Local groms learn to rip at Ma`alaea's Buzz's Wharf surf break. Outrigger canoe clubs take shelter and rest on the Harbor's small beach. Families fish off the harbor wall or spear fish on nearby reefs. Harbor-based ships ferry visitors and residents on whale watch expeditions, fishing trips and snorkel tours. Local Hawaiians know Ma'alaea as a special place from ancient times, since it is surrounded by many nearby cultural sites.
Everyone agrees that Ma'alaea is important to their lives. Besides its famed swells, Ma'alaea is one of the windiest spots on Maui, yet it 1952 it was chosen by the Territory of Hawaii as the preferred site for a small boat harbor. State workman tore down the remains of Maui's second largest heiau (temple) upslope from the harbor site to use the stones for a massive breakwater.

Complaints about the harbor's safety during stormy weather began a few months after it was opened. This resulted in construction of another large breakwater in 1959. Additional harbor modifications followed in the early '60's, but the complaints continued. In the late 1960's the State of Hawaii and the Army Corps of Engineers came up with the "ultimate solution" for the harbor's problems- blast a new harbor entrance guarded by a huge new break wall, the length of two football fields!

Maui 's most experienced watermen pointed out that the proposed break wall faced the wrong direction to block the majority of storm waves that entered the harbor during South swells. They were ignored. The plan had lots of other drawbacks. It proposed to expand Ma`alaea harbor to twice its current boat capacity, putting pressure on local ocean life already overrun by commercial fishing and tour traffic. Breakwater construction would involve destruction of 4.8 acres of healthy reef- bringing certain death to small marine creatures, silting reefs and disrupting both whale and turtle habitat. The proposed plan also eliminates Off-the-wall, a popular surf spot, and the canoe launching beach.

Veteran Pipeline waveriders are also concerned that the new breakwall and channel will alter forever the Ma'alaea Freight Train. For over thirty years the majority of Ma'alaea residents along with Maui's surfers, paddlers, marine biologists and cultural leaders have asked for another plan. The Surfrider Foundation, Maui Chapter and its allies, Protect Ma'alaea Coalition and Sierra Club Maui, are determined to see a practical, non-destructive alternative harbor improvement plan presented to the community. All who want to save one of the world's greatest surf sites can help make this a reality.

World renowned ocean sports photographer Rick Leeks has made available sizzling original photo prints of Ma'alaea to help fund and alternative plan. Together we can save the wave for future generations.

Donations, T-shirt and Photo Print sales help Surfrider’s ongoing Campaign to Save the Waves at Ma’alaea. T-shirts; Rick Leeks Photography