More than 1,130 Big Island homes were damaged by Sunday's earthquakes, another 29 are uninhabitable and the preliminary, overall cost from the quakes reached $100 million yesterday.

County and state officials expect the bill to jump higher because estimates are still coming in for pricey items such as home repairs.

The big-ticket costs so far are $43.5 million to fix Big Island schools and $20 million for county and state roads and bridges.

State transportation officials also may need to replace a bridge on the primary road between Hilo and Waimea.

The state Department of Education has decided that Honoka'a Elementary and Waikoloa Elementary will remain closed for the rest of this week. Teachers have been told to work at home.

The DOE expects to reopen the schools Monday using some community buildings.

About 250 farms and ranches along the Hamakua Ditch are also without their regular irrigation water after landslides buried two of the three intakes that feed water into the ditch in Waipi'o.

Kalopa orchid farmer Jerome Akasaki spent the past year ramping up production after losing about $1 million in plants and sales when the ditch was blocked with dirt and debris during flooding in 2004.

Since Sunday, Akasaki has not received water from the 24-mile Hamakua ditch. But he is getting some water from the county system.

"It's not sufficient, but at least we can have the plants survive," Akasaki said.

Other farmers rely completely on ditch water and will have bigger problems, he said.

The earthquakes also released landslides that buried all four intakes that feed the Waimea ditch system.

The Waimea system is 15 miles long and irrigates 566 acres. The larger Hamakua system delivers water to 4,755 acres.

The 110 farmers and ranchers on the Waimea system can draw water from a full 100 million-gallon reservoir and a partially full 60 million-gallon reservoir in the area. They will also be able to get water from a deep well that's being connected to feed the farms, said Board of Agriculture Chairwoman Sandra Lee Kunimoto.

DAMAGE UNKNOWN

Agriculture officials flew over the water systems but have been unable to get a closer look from the ground because of wet weather and safety concerns from aftershocks that continue to rattle the Big Island.

"We do not know the extent of the damage because we can't even get up in there," Kunimoto said. "We have to hike in there or be able to helicopter in and land to do an inspection."

Both the Waimea and Hamakua systems will qualify for federal assistance under the disaster declaration issued by President Bush, Kunimoto said.

At the reopened Kawaihae Harbor on the Kona side of the Big Island, crews worked Tuesday night to fill in cracks and repave areas of Pier 2 to prepare for off-loading a Young Bros. barge yesterday. Additional barges were expected at the pier tomorrow, said Barry Fukunaga, deputy director of the Department of Transportation for harbors.

Pier 1 and a portion of Pier 2 remained closed yesterday, but Fukunaga said most shipping in and out of the harbor "essentially can be resumed without any real problem."

Pier 1, which is about 477 feet long, may have settled and pulled away from the land, opening cracks between the concrete pier and the asphalt on the shore.

"There was a crack, we filled the crack, but the question is what caused the crack," Fukunaga said. "We just need to make sure we have a situation there that we understand."

Fukunaga said recent rains left the water under Pier 1 cloudy, and a dive crew was waiting until the water cleared before inspecting Pier 1's support structure.

Pier 1 is primarily used for shipping cattle and cement, and those operations could be complicated if the pier is found to have serious structural damage.

CANOE HOUSE MAY GO

One warehouse on the pier that has been used by a community group building a voyaging canoe appears to be "structurally compromised" and will likely be torn down, Fukunaga said.

Even without a complete estimate, the cost of repairing Kawaihae Harbor already has reached $7 million.

At the 1,500-foot Pier 2, engineers concluded that a similar separation between the land and the pier was caused by land subsidence of 2 to 8 inches along the pier. Since the pier was found to be sound, portions of Pier 2 were reopened.

"The land area near the harbor — a lot of it was built with fill material," Fukunaga said, " ... and that is what was affected by the earthquake."

Both abutments of the bridge over the Ka'awali'i stream near the 35-mile marker of Hawai'i Belt Road may need to be replaced, said Brennon Morioka, deputy director for state highways.

"Although it's safe for travel right now, the long-term solution is either major repairs to the abutment or just replace the bridge and redo the abutment from scratch," Morioka said.

He estimated the cost to repair the bridge and an adjacent lane that collapsed at $6 million to $7 million.

BRIDGE DAMAGE

Honokoa Gulch on Route 270 in North Kohala needs a more thorough assessment, Morioka said. But damage to two girders under the makai lane of the bridge is expected to cost about $1 million.

Crews have also been working to clear debris from the shoulders of the Queen Ka'ahumanu and Akone Pule highways to prepare for the bicycle race portion of Saturday's Ironman Triathlon.

"Our guys have been working every day since Sunday," Morioka said, "and we believe that we should be able to clear the shoulder areas so that they will have a safe route for the bike race."

Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com and Kevin Dayton at kdayton@honoluluadvertiser.com.