“It’s a deeply dark day,” said Richard Bissen, the mayor of the island of Maui, to the press, confirming “six deaths”. This provisional assessment is likely to increase as search and rescue operations continue.
Scenes “worthy of a horror movie”
The fires mainly affect the island of Maui, and to a lesser extent that of Hawaii. They were aggravated by violent winds, going up to 130 km / h, fed by the force of Hurricane Dora, which is currently passing through the Pacific Ocean, several hundred kilometers south of the archipelago.
The resort town of Lahaina on Maui’s west coast was the hardest hit and was largely destroyed by the blazes.
This seaside resort of 12,000 inhabitants experienced scenes “worthy of a horror movie”, testified Claire Kent, a resident whose house was destroyed by fire, on CNN. She described the chaos that gripped the town with “people stuck in traffic”, amid “burning cars on both sides of the road”.
“Overwhelmed” hospitals
“Much of Lahaina…has been destroyed and hundreds of local families have been displaced,” Hawaii Governor Josh Green said in a statement. Flyovers over the city identified “more than 271 structures” damaged, according to Maui County.
In the city center, “apart from a few buildings here and there, everything is rubble,” a law enforcement officer told AFP, on condition of anonymity. The area “has not been searched or cleared at all,” he added, explaining that he expected rescuers to find bodies. “Given the amount of charred material, (…) I don’t think there is much life in there.
Pinned down by the flames, some townspeople threw themselves into the sea to try to survive: 14 people were rescued from the waters off Lahaina, authorities said. The island’s hospital network is ‘overwhelmed’ with patients suffering from burns or inhaling smoke, according to Vice Governor Sylvia Luke, who says the situation is ‘dramatic’. Authorities are trying to transfer patients to other islands.
“All available federal means” mobilized
According to Maui County, more than 2,100 people have been housed in emergency centers, and about 2,000 travelers have been housed at Kahului Airport, pending evacuation.
The National Guard has been activated and US President Joe Biden has announced the mobilization of “all available federal means” on the archipelago to fight the fires.
The wind has knocked down many electric poles and communication networks are cut on part of Maui. This greatly complicates the task of rescue, because even the 911 emergency call service does not work in some areas of the island. According to the PowerOutage site, around 13,000 homes and businesses remained without electricity on Wednesday evening in the archipelago.
Residents “devastated”
Lahaina resident Roxanne Zimmerman was among the first to evacuate the city on Tuesday afternoon. According to aerial footage she saw on social media, the building where she lived was destroyed. “We are devastated, we don’t know how we are going to rebuild, or even if we can do it. And even more, we don’t know how many people we have lost,” she told AFP by phone. .
The western part of Maui has been in the grip of drought “for two years”, according to the 34-year-old photographer. “With this hurricane passing to the south, it was the perfect conditions for a fire to take everything.”
Head of a surf school on the island, Elizabeth Smith is worried about six of her employees who live in Lahaina. “We know that a couple could be evacuated, but we don’t know about the others,” she told AFP by telephone, explaining that communications remained difficult.
“I don’t want to be dramatic, but I don’t think such a thing has ever happened in Maui,” said the resident, who has lived there for more than 30 years. “It is unusual to have so many areas affected by fires, they are all over the island.”
The fact that the fires were indirectly fueled by strong winds exacerbated by Hurricane Dora is “unprecedented” because such weather events usually bring rain and flooding to Hawaii, the vice governor said.
Millions of people have been hit by extreme weather events around the world in recent weeks, events that scientists say are exacerbated by climate change.