Two people are dead, including a 63-year-old Hollister, Calif., man, and one injured after being swept into the ocean by strong currents this week at Ke Iki Beach in Pupukea on Oahu’s North Shore following a high wave advisory warning .
Bryan Kunic, 63, a retired engineer from Hollister, was on the shore alongside his wife, Carolyn Killions, when tragedy struck Monday, Killions wrote in a GoFundMe post .
“He was sitting up on the beach. A huge wave came in, rolled him and pulled him into the ocean,” she wrote.
Two other people swept into the tide were Oklahoma City native Susie Jett, 72, and her daughter, Laura Rich, 41. Jett was taken to a hospital and put on life support but later died from her injuries, according to a GoFundMe page posted by a family friend.
Rich, a mother of five, is still hospitalized in stable condition. She and Jett were in the water for about 20 minutes before being rescued, the post said.
A storm system moving across Hawaii was responsible for the powerful waves that claimed the lives of Kunic and Jett.