When the state’s dredging of Pohoiki Bay began, it was meant to be a homecoming. Seven years after lava sealed the boat ramp, Puna’s fishers would finally reach the sea again.
But weeks after the project finished, the channel was gone — filled once more with sand and stone. The water turned stagnant, the fish inside suffocated, and the celebration faded into a kind of stunned quiet.
For a $9 million project, the failure looked sudden. It wasn’t…