Qualla: Pe'ahi (Jaws)

Pe'ahi (Jaws): Introduction

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit KanoaWithington at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. Three surfers named John were riding a break on Maui's north shore in 1975 when the ocean changed its mind. What had been manageable waves suddenly transformed into something enormous, unpredictable, and terrifying. John Roberson, John Lemus, and John Potterick scrambled for safety, and when they made it to shore they gave the break a nickname borrowed from the movie that was scaring audiences that same summer: Jaws. The name was a joke at first, a surfer's way of processing a near-death experience. It became literal. Pe'ahi, as the place is properly called in Hawaiian -- a word meaning "wave" in the sense of a beckoning hand -- produces some of the largest rideable waves on Earth, faces exceeding 60 feet that break over an underwater ridge roughly three miles east of the town of Pa'ia.

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Image: KanoaWithington at English Wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

Pe'ahi (Jaws): The Beckoning Hand

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. The name Pe'ahi originally belonged to an ahupua'a, one of the ancient Hawaiian land divisions that ran from the slopes of Haleakala down to the sea. The Hawaiian word means a fanning or beckoning motion, and the name for the surf break is an English-language play on that ancient...

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Image: Public domain

Pe'ahi (Jaws): Inventing a Way In

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. For years after its discovery, Jaws was considered unrideable. The waves were too big, too fast, and too far from any launch point for traditional paddle-in surfing. That changed in the early 1990s when Laird Hamilton, Dave Kalama, Darrick Doerner, and Buzzy Kerbox developed tow-...

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Image: Public domain

Pe'ahi (Jaws): Paddling Back Into the Giant

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Margarethallahan, CC BY-SA 4.0. Tow-in surfing opened Jaws, but a new generation of riders decided to close the gap between technology and raw human capability. In 2001, South African Chris Bertish became the first person to paddle into giant surf at Pe'ahi without jet ski assistance. In 2007, Brazilian surfers...

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Image: Margarethallahan | CC BY-SA 4.0

Pe'ahi (Jaws): The Break That Sets Its Own Schedule

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jeff Rowley, CC BY 2.0. Jaws does not perform on command. The massive swells that produce rideable waves arrive from the North Pacific between December and March, generated by storms thousands of miles away. Whether those swells hit the underwater ridge at the right angle and with the right period to pr...

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Image: Jeff Rowley | CC BY 2.0