An Oahi at Haena

Oahi was the practice of hurling firebrands from the summits of Kauai’s 1,115-foot-tall Mount Makana at Haena and Mount Kamaile, rising roughly 1,500 feet above the Na Pali coastline at Nualolo — the only sites in Hawaii where this ancient and time-honored custom was performed.

Originally a Hawaiian religious rite, oahi took place every few years on Kauai until about a century ago.

One of the best known, and one of the last, exhibitions of firebrand throwing from atop Mount Makana was given on Saturday evening, May 7, 1910, by Haena’s genial police officer, Mahi Puulei, in honor of his wife’s birthday the previous Friday.

At that time, it was hard to find men willing to make the dangerous climb up Mount Makana’s sheer cliffs, yet four fearless Hawaiian men finally volunteered, and by late afternoon, they’d carried 300 to 400 hau tree sticks, 9 or 10 feet long and 2 or 3 inches in diameter, up to the summit.

By 8 p.m., the time set for the oahi to commence, a large crowd had arrived on foot, or in horse carriages or automobiles, and had assembled on the Haena flats below Mount Makana to view the spectacle.

Some of the burning firebrands, failing to get caught up in air currents, fell upon the cliffside, igniting dry grass and shrubbery, and before long, the entire seaward section of the mountain was aflame.

Others fell onto the flats, but most were carried by tradewinds out and upward over the ocean, where they could be seen blazing brightly and falling beyond the reefs and breakers into deep water.

The four men on the peak continued to throw their burning sticks until around 10:30 p.m., when their supplies ran out and they made their perilous way down to the flat.

Below, the Puulei’s had prepared a luau for them and for all their guests who’d gathered in the yard of their residence on the Haena flats, some of whom did not get back to their own homes until dawn.