As the first residents returned to Lahaina this weekend, just days after Maui’s devastating fires all but leveled the historic town, some got out of their cars and simply stared.
There was always much to marvel over in the waterfront community of 13,000 people, the former capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom: the shops on Front Street, the Pioneer Inn and Waiola church, and the endless sprawl of the 150-year-old banyan tree. This week’s disaster laid waste to all of it.
On a dirt pullout off a main road on Saturday, residents stood next to their cars and took in the sweeping view of the ruined town – singed and collapsing palm trees swaying in the wind, stone foundations holding up nothing, crumbling power lines and so many empty shells of buildings. The wreckage stretches all the way to the sea, a reminder of the ferocity and speed of the blaze that moved so quickly that residents ran into the water to escape the flames. Some spent hours in the ocean before they were rescued.
The true toll of the destruction is not yet known. The fires, the deadliest in recent American history, killed at least 93 people. Officials continue to warn that the number will likely grow, leaving those who live here and across Maui to reckon with unfathomable losses: friends, family, community members.
Hawaii’s governor, Josh Green, has cautioned the state that “the full extent of the destruction of Lahaina will shock you”. It appears as if a bomb went off, he has said.
But no amount of warning can prepare people for seeing their homes, or a community they knew and loved, wiped off the map. “Oh my god,” two Maui residents who traveled to the town with a van delivering medical aid from the humanitarian group Direct Relief repeated to themselves as the sprinter van wound its way through the ruins.
The difference between seeing disasters on the news and having your community experience one firsthand is stark, said Felipe Hannel, a Maui resident who was helping deliver supplies with Direct Relief.
“You see it on TV. You feel sorry for everybody. Maybe you lose sleep for a night, but then life keeps going,” Hannel said. “But when you know the place, it’s different. You’re crying. You get so emotionally involved. You know these people, you know their lives.”
Just north of the devastated blocks of Lahaina, shopping centers have been transformed into resource hubs for those on the still closed western side of the island. Doctors distribute medical supplies, volunteers offer clothes and toiletries. In the parking lot of one plaza, in between Super Cuts, a spa and a DMV office, chefs with the World Central Kitchen served meals to families returning to the area. Meanwhile, the smell of smoke lingers, as if someone had just lit a match.
