Kevin Lyman Wiser, 41, a former Ogden resident, Weber State University graduate and newspaper reporter in California and Idaho, died in an accidental drowning in Maui on Sunday, May 4.
Maui Police Sgt. Max Kincaid said Wiser, who been vacationing in Hawaii for about a day, drowned when he fell into a blowhole at Makalele Point, near Kahakaloa Fishing Village on Maui's north shore.
"He was looking down into the blowhole when a huge wave came up from behind him and pushed him into the blowhole and through an underwater cave," Kincaid said.
Wiser's body was retrieved by emergency rescue crews about an hour later and he was found about 100 yards from where he fell.
Kincaid said a blowhole is an underwater cave. With each incoming wave, the water pressure is pushed upward like a geyser. There are several such blowholes in Hawaii. Stormy weather has caused several other deaths and rescues involving such blowholes recently.
There were two near drownings in the west Maui district on May 4; and on May 3, another tourist had drowned in a blowhole on Oahu.
Wiser graduated from Ogden High School and in 1998 graduated from Weber State University. He had worked at the Idaho Mountain Express in Ketchum and had won several newspaper awards, including one in Utah for a story he had written for The Event newspaper. He was employed by The Union newspaper in Grass Valley, Calif., where he reported on politics, mental health and education at the time of his death. He was an avid skier and mountain climber.
He is the son of Lyman S. and Ramona P. Wiser of Ogden.
Funeral services are pending in Ogden.