The state says it is pulling out all the stops in its effort to clean out the mouth of the Ala Wai Boat harbor.

Yesterday workers began a two-day special process of cleaning the debris trap at the mouth of the harbor that will cost what the state normally spends to keep the trap cleaned out for an entire year.

Unlike previous cleanings, the work is being handled by a hazardous-materials company using a method that's more time consuming and meticulous, said Peter Young, chairman of the Department of Land and Natural Resources.

The project is being done on a scale unusual to the Islands in the interest of public health and safety, said Young during a press conference at the site.

He said the decision to use a hazmat team to clean the trap manually was in response to the dumping of nearly 50 million gallons of raw sewage into the Ala Wai Canal after a Waikiki force main broke last month.

Young said concerns relating to the death of one person who went into the Ala Wai after the spill, others who have received infections, and fears that raw sewage could be intermixed with materials caught in the trap contributed to the decision.

"We wanted to be cautious in the cleanup process, so we have a company that is focusing on hazmat rather than someone simply taking debris out of the water.

"These people are trained to handle this type of material."

Shouting to be heard above the noise of heavy equipment behind him scooping muck from the trap, Young said the cleanup will cost around $50,000, paid from the Boating Special Fund.

The state may ask the city to reimburse the costs, he said.

"We normally clean the trap three to four times a year," said Young, who added that each of those cleanings runs between $4,000 and $6,000. He said this cleaning is the fifth since heavy rains started this year.

Young said the trap at the base of the Ala Moana boulevard bridge is the final catch point between the ocean and mountain watershed above it.

"If the trap wasn't there that would drain right into the ocean," said Young, pointing to the large trap ring filled with brown sludge and everything from tree limbs, plastic bottles and foam containers to coconuts, tires, rubber slippers and soccer balls.

Young said that because of the heavy rains and extraordinary sewage spill, the trap was not able to contain all the surface debris from the canal. He could not say how much debris might have escaped into the ocean.

He said the state plans to send divers in to test the waters as soon as it is safe, but he wasn't sure when that would be. After that the state would have a better idea of what the long term effects of the spill will be on the harbor, he added.

Even as Young spoke, a team from Pacific Environmental Corporation used a backhoe to scoop debris from the trap, place it onto a screen, allow it to drain, and then spray it with a cleaning solution before loading it into one of four 20-foot metal containers.

Once they're filled, those containers will be hauled to the Waimanalo Gulch Landfill on the Wai'anae Coast, he said.

Bystanders along the bridge watched the work. Tourists Bernie and Joann Tafoya of Illinois snapped photos to show to their daughter, Joelle Tafoya, 19, a University of Hawai'i freshman who frequently surfs in waters off Waikiki.

"I wanted to show her what she's surfing in," said Bernie, who's a reporter with WBBM News Radio in Chicago. "But she knows what she's doing. She's an adult and she knows water. She's been a lifeguard in Chicago. "

But Bruce Middleton, a retired law enforcement officer who lives in the Summer Palace on the Ala Wai Canal and keeps a boat docked in the harbor, said he wondered what will happen after all the news dies down.

"What is on everyone's mind, quite frankly, is whether or not, when this news cycle is over, are they going to be down here trying to resolve the problem?" he said.

"The pollution you see here coming down the Ala Wai consistently ending up in a stagnant portion of the harbor along the front row treats our visitors to a spectacle of a Third World country."

Young said the hazmat team would refocus its attention tomorrow on cleaning the moorings fronting the Prince Hotel along the harbor's front row, a location that has a history of accumulating canal debris.

The team may also clean other parts of the Ala Wai Boat Harbor, he said.

Reach Will Hoover at whoover@honoluluadvertiser.com.