“The mountain behind us caught on fire and nobody told us anything.” So said Vilma Reed, 63, whose house in Lahaina burned down. “You know when we found (out) there was a fire?” she told AFP. “When it was across the street from us.”
By Saturday night the county of Maui had confirmed 93 deaths, up from 89 earlier in the day, making the blaze the deadliest wildfire in the United States since 1918. That year 453 people died in Minnesota and Wisconsin, according to the National Fire Protection Association. The toll has also passed that of California’s 2018 Camp Fire, which killed 86 and virtually wiped the town of Paradise off the map.
Governor Josh Green did not expect it to stop there. “It’s going to continue to rise. We want to brace people for that,” he said.
Damage and the search
The Federal Emergency Management Agency said more than 2,200 structures were damaged or destroyed. Damage came to US$5.5 billion, and thousands of people were left homeless. Lahaina, a town of more than 12,000 and once home to the Hawaiian royal family, now stands in ruins. A banyan tree that has been at the centre of the community for 150 years is scarred and stripped of leaves, though it still stands.
Searchers have covered only a small fraction of the disaster zone. Maui police chief John Pelletier said just two victims had been identified, because of how badly they were burned. “The remains we’re finding are from a fire that melted metal,” he said. Each identification will need rapid DNA. “When we pick up the remains… they fall apart.”
Elsewhere on the island, firefighters were still working on at least one other blaze in the inland Upcountry. The Pulehu/Kihei fire in the south was declared fully contained on Saturday night.
Questions over the warning
Hawaii’s attorney general, Anne Lopez, said her office would examine “critical decision-making and standing policies leading up to, during and after the wildfires on Maui and Hawaii islands this week.”
Hawaii congresswoman Jill Tokuda told CNN that officials were caught off guard. “We underestimated the lethality, the quickness of fire,” she said. Power outages across Maui kept many residents from getting emergency alerts on their phones, which Tokuda said officials should have prepared for. No emergency sirens sounded, and many residents say they learned of the fire when neighbors ran down the street. The state’s own emergency management plan last year had rated the risk wildfires posed to people as “low.”
Green defended the immediate response. Several fires and strong winds complicated matters, he said. “Having seen that storm, we have doubts that much could have been done with a fiery fast-moving fire like that.”
Locked out
For people who fled, Saturday brought another blow. Maui police said no members of the public would be allowed into Lahaina, even those who could prove they lived there, until the area was declared safe. Anyone who enters faces a misdemeanour punishable by up to one year in jail and a US$2,000 fine.
Some residents waited at a roadblock for hours, hoping to search the ashes or look for missing pets or relatives. Then, NBC News reported, the way was abruptly shut. “How are people supposed to get there? The roads are closed,” said resident Daniel Rice. “Get some authority out there. Figure it out. This is nonsense.”
Anthony Garcia, 80, told AFP the fire had gutted his apartment. “It took everything, everything! It’s heartbreaking,” he said. Reed, meanwhile, was sleeping in her car with her daughter, her grandson and two cats. “This is my home now,” she said, and the family was relying on handouts and the kindness of strangers.
Sources
- Hawaii fire death toll climbs to 93, making it the deadliest US wildfire in more than 100 years
- Lahaina Maui Fire is Deadliest Hawai fire | Assess the Impact
- Hawaii wildfire death toll climbs to at least 93 as pain and anger grows
