It’s also unsurprising: Kerby is one of the most aquatic souls I’ve ever met. While other people stepped out for sandwiches, Kerby was traversing Waimanalo Bay, clad in a black shorty wet suit, scuba mask and fins. To commute from his desk to the ocean, all he had to do was climb down a ladder: Kerby’s workplace, the Hawaii Undersea Research Lab (HURL), occupied most of the pier. Rain or shine, in perfect calm conditions or in the face of approaching hurricanes, he swam the same two-mile circuit every day at lunchtime-a routine he’d observed for the past 40 years. By Hawaiian standards it was a drab day, with stern clouds overhead and a brisk wind giving the water a bouncy chop. To our right, the Pacific Ocean ran uninterrupted to Baja California. To our left, volcanic cliffs framed Oahu’s eastern shore. We popped up about 50 yards away, clear of the gauntlet of fishing lines hanging from the pier. Kerby was close to 70 years old, but to watch him free dive you’d never guess it.
I adjusted my goggles, took a deep breath and followed him. Before I could answer he was gone in a hail of bubbles, weaving through wooden pilings and arrowing 20 feet down to the seafloor.
Of course we were going to see the sharks.
“Should we go see the sharks?” Terry Kerby asked, treading water beneath the Makai Research Pier.
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