Major thumbs up to Kona Aggressor for hurricane-interrupted trip

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DavidFL

Wide-eyed nube in the Pub
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Two frogfish in a photo taken diving from Kona Aggressor August 2018.jpg
My dive buddy and I were on Kona Aggressor during the week in August that Hurricane Lane decided to approach Hawaii. This was my fifth trip on an Aggressor yacht but my first on Kona Aggressor. As you can tell by the title, Hurricane Lane ended up interrupting the trip; we were put ashore in Kailua Kona on Wednesday evening, instead of the normal return to port on Friday afternoon.

From my perspective, the situation could not have been handled any better. Captain Randy and the crew kept us informed as the situation developed. The yacht's owners (Live/Dive Pacific; kudos to Ops Manager Evin Cotter) had been working hard in the background as the situation developed. By the time we went ashore they had arranged hotel accommodations for us. (I had visions of sleeping in some high school gym floor /shelter). The hotel where we sheltered (some people got early flights home; my dive buddy and I decided to wait it out and stick with our original Saturday return flights) was the very comfortable King Kamehameha Marriott Courtyard. They promised reimbursement at a generous daily rate for our meals....and the check for reimbursement arrived. They arranged for one member of the crew to stay ashore with us to coordinate while the rest of the crew sheltered on the boat tied up to a buoy in the harbor. Two buoys, actually, they broke loose at least once, relocated at least twice.

In the 2-3 days prior to going ashore early, the Captain and crew of the yacht adjusted the plan and route, obviously, but we kept diving because the dive conditions were good.

As a side note, Kona was apparently an ancient Hawaiian harbor known to be a great place to shelter from a storm, and the ancients knew what they were doing. The "other" side of the Big Island got torrential rain, flooding, and a lot of wind. In Kona I think the rain total was 1-2" and we never experienced high winds.

So, in summary, knowing the hurricane might be a factor after a couple of days into the week's charter: we were kept well informed, the crew maximized the number and quality of dives while we were still in the water, and they made all the arrangements to take care of us ashore.

As a final gesture of goodwill, we received a very generous "Storm Check" voucher usable on the Kona Aggressor or the other yachts owned by the same organization, for up to 24 months.
 
That's great it all worked out but it's too bad that your trip was interrupted, did you get to do the night dive with mantas? How did you like Kona diving during the dives that you got?

Nice to hear that the crew and owners handled it so well, what other liveaboards do they own?
 
Live/Dive Pacific also owns Palau Aggressor II and Rock Island Aggressor.

We did the manta dive on Sunday night. I think the mantas might have gotten the memo about the hurricane; we waited on the bottom with lights ablaze for about 45 minutes, and only one manta showed up. Still amazing and spectacular, but less than the experience of many others. We didn't get the pelagic magic dive in.

I liked the Kona diving; it's obviously different than the Caribbean / Bahamas / Florida where my other liveaboards have been. One really big difference is there is no continental shelf, so diving at recreational depths is usually pretty close in to the shoreline. Makes for some dramatic scenes....the attached photo has my dive buddy in the scene looking for the exit to a lava tube!
 

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Live/Dive Pacific also owns Palau Aggressor II and Rock Island Aggressor.

We did the manta dive on Sunday night. I think the mantas might have gotten the memo about the hurricane; we waited on the bottom with lights ablaze for about 45 minutes, and only one manta showed up. Still amazing and spectacular, but less than the experience of many others. We didn't get the pelagic magic dive in.

I liked the Kona diving; it's obviously different than the Caribbean / Bahamas / Florida where my other liveaboards have been. One really big difference is there is no continental shelf, so diving at recreational depths is usually pretty close in to the shoreline. Makes for some dramatic scenes....the attached photo has my dive buddy in the scene looking for the exit to a lava tube!

That fact that it is different from Caribbean diving and close to shore are things that I liked about the Kona Aggressor trip. I am prone to seasickness when a deep-water crossing is involved, but I didn't get at all sick on the Kona Aggressor! You don't see the beautiful soft corals that you find elsewhere, but healthy hard corals and lots of great fish life are available on dives around the Big Island!

Plus, Hawaii is just so beautiful! It's too bad that you had weather issues; I hope that you get to go back!

Did you take trip insurance when you booked the vacation? Do you know if any of the folks that decided to fly home early had insurance and if their insurance actually covered the expenses?
 
I did have trip insurance, but as you clearly figured out I had no claim / made no claim in this case, as I did not personally incur any extra expense. I did not have a policy with a so-called "live-aboard" rider. In my one experience of making a claim on trip insurance when an entire live aboard trip was cancelled at the last minute for a hurricane, you don't really know if the claim will pay off for several months until the check arrives. My expectation would be that the "trip interruption" coverage would be in force in this case. The maritime authorities closed the harbor and declared all commercial operations had to cease by midnight Wednesday, so there is an externally verifiable reference documenting why the boat trip had to be interrupted. By the time we were put ashore, the airlines (at least my airline, Delta) had already waived change fees. So, with hotel and meals covered before an earlier return flight, and airline change fees waived, any insurance claim would have needed to be very well documented. In my previous claim, the insurance carrier got a detailed report direct from the liveaboard operator, so the carrier would have detailed knowledge of what things had been covered by them.
 
Good to hear a positive story in a tough situation. I'll be on the Kona Aggressor in December. Looking forward to seeing the different environments.
 
That's great it all worked out but it's too bad that your trip was interrupted, did you get to do the night dive with mantas? How did you like Kona diving during the dives that you got?

Nice to hear that the crew and owners handled it so well, what other liveaboards do they own?
 
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