The Maui fire disaster
I have no idea how the people of Maui will react, but Biden will finally be visiting.
There are still between 850 and 1,000 missing people from the area. It is tragically ominous:
“For the schools that started today, I can’t imagine what roll call looks like … when one in every four is likely not going to be there in those classes, in those neighborhoods,” Fielding said. “I don’t know how you have enough teachers or counselors or therapists, or how you… there’s no way to do justice to the real tragedy on the ground.”
Hawaii Gov. Josh Green told reporters over the weekend it’s “possible that there will be many children” among the unaccounted for.
The exact number of missing people is still changing.
Maui County Mayor Richard Bissen said in a video that 850 names are on a list of missing persons. Bissen said the number of missing people dropped from 1,000 people after lists from the FBI, Red Cross and Maui police were combined.
When there is a large disaster of that sort, many people flee and stay in shelters or with friends. So my guess – and hope – is that a great great many of the missing will be found alive. But the fear is that most of them are actually dead. I assume we’ll be finding out in the next few weeks as it all sorts out.
No matter what, the Maui response appears to have been very poor:
The fire itself was started by poorly maintained power lines, which for years had been identified as a wildfire risk due to their poor condition and proximity to invasive grasses that act as tinder in late summer. The power company was well aware of the issue and had been slow-walking remediation.
Battling wildfires in Maui is a politically contentious issue–so much so that water is not routinely released to battle wildfires and in this case, it took hours to get the water turned on to battle the fire once it got out of control. In fact, early in the day, the fire had been classified as “contained” when it obviously wasn’t. …
The official in charge of emergency response in Maui was a politician with no experience in emergency management, who has since resigned. He made the fateful decision not to warn residents of the raging wildfire. No sirens were sounded, and by the time the text-based warning system was activated cellular service was already out for most people. Residents literally had no warning until they saw the flames speeding toward them. …
When residents finally began to flee the fire all the exits from town were blocked by police cars, who had been ordered to push residents to Front Street at the water’s edge, and a police car blocked the exit out of the town on Front Street as well. That is why you see photos of cars packed together on the main street of town–they were prevented from leaving by the authorities.
Much more at the link.
I don’t know whether some of this is rumor or whether all of it is true. But it makes for ghastly and infuriating reading. There seems to have been a tremendous lack of preparedness and a tremendous amount of confusion. Again, let’s hope we find out more over time.
That’s all pretty incredible. Incredibly bad.
The other thing I’ve heard about this tragedy is the recurring issue of lack of communication, post disaster. While these events are out of the ordinary, they happen with enough frequency that you would think that something could be done to provide emergency communications for the average citizen.
a calamity like katrina nearly 20 years ago, like puerto rico a half dozen years ago,
in both cases, the kakistocracy is firmly in charge,
Wonder if we’ll see the truncated, context-ectomized quote about how “We can share it, but it requires true conversations about equity” pop up again…. it’s not just the MSM who peddles them and it’s worth reminding ourselves.
Where’s the link?
The guy who wanted to have a “discussion of equity around water” distribution should be fired (and more). Same with the guy who failed to sound the alarms which would have at least have notified people that something was wrong. And the Hawaiian electric company, just like PG&E in California, failed to anticipate the potential for flammability around their lines in dry and windy conditions, probably due to some climate change/environmental credo. All around failure of institutions and individuals in charge of those institutions to do their jobs and put the people first. No one will be accountable. Just like Biden, they will show no interest in identifying any problem much less correcting it, and get away with it.
No one will pay for the consequences, and they will sadly vote for the same people again. I do fell sad for the residents of Lahaina.
Do you know who is a major, if not majority, investor in that Maui electric company that was more concerned about global warming than maintenance of power lines? Blackrock, the huge investment fund that is focused on ESG. I wonder if that investor was pushing the global warming issue ?
Mark Faby:
There are three links in the post. The first is on “Biden will finally.” The second is on “between 850 and 1,000 missing.” The third is on “Maui response appears to have been.”
For wildfire-fighting purposes, would it have been feasible to set up a system to pump from the inexhaustible seawater at hand, esp. if there is local concern about preserving freshwater resources? Or would the salt content do more harm than good (although the good could be saving lives)? I believe that ship-based systems would pump seawater to save the ship and crew.
Hawai’i is a very blue state. Chalk up another “win” for the Democrats. And of course since it’s them no consequences whatsoever.
The idiot who did not sound the emergency siren resigned. The idiot who delayed the release of water to refill reservoir used to fight the fire has been assigned to a new position. It is too early to tell whether the use of simple common sense by either would have saved lives. Nevertheless, both officials have demonstrated that they are not competent to manage public safety and likely anything else in the public domain.
On Maui, two weeks later, the missing list is down from 1100 to 850 or so. There’s been time for those people, if alive, to check in with shelters or friends or relatives. With the 110+ “officially” dead, I fear the final toll will be near 1000. For many, incineration meant there isn’t anything left with DNA to identify.
As in California, a focus on “renewable energy” development meant electric line maintenance and wildfire prevention measures weren’t funded.
The emergency manager (unqualified) who didn’t sound the sirens said that in Hawaii, the sirens, located mostly on the shore, are used as tsunami warnings. They did use other warning systems, but unfortunately power was out and people didn’t get the warnings. The two worst actions, in my mind, were the refusal for five hours to allow water to be diverted to fire-fighting, which might have stopped the fires before they reached town, and the police blockade of the roads leaving Lahaina. Cars stacked up along the waterfront and many people burned to death in them.
There doesn’t seem to have been any cohesive wildfire protocol. No planning, no leadership.
I have never understood why it is deemed appropriate for politicians to visit disaster areas.
In particular, there is no Presidential visit anywhere, at any time, that does not cause serious disruption.
I won’t even touch on the environmental impact of flying his great big plane, and all of the logistical support planes, to Hawaii and back to his vacation estate in Tahoe. That would be cynical.
But the monetary cost could have been put into relief/rebuilding efforts.
How much of a dipshit do you have to be to purposely block the exit?
Like, I’m imagining cars trying to get through to leave and cops ACTIVELY holding them there. Is that what actually happened? How could any of them live with themselves? I don’t care what their orders were – what purpose does it serve to keep people trapped with an inferno coming for them?
Democrats are sick. From PR to Portland to Hawaii, they are a sickness of evil and must be excused from our lands. [ meme needed, like “Democrats are SICK”]
Disasters like this are truly heartbreaking, and they are destined to happen from time to time, no matter who is in charge. But it seems to me that bureaucratic style decision making is disproportionately often to blame. I think I’ve posted this before here, but very appropriate to this post.
https://www.stephenhicks.org/2016/11/12/the-bhopal-chemical-spill-disaster-who-is-to-blame/
The Bhopal disaster is often singled out as quintessential corporate evil. Except that it wasn’t.
Planning for emergency notification but not anticipating that the power might be out is not really planning.
What Oldflyer said.
At this point money and supplies for the island are far more important than the physical presence of POTUS. His airplane and the palace guard (Secret Service) needed to secure things are just an interference with the real work that needs to be done.
My hope is that Joe doesn’t try to turn this into an excuse for more and bigger spending on climate change.
The people of Maui need help and hope, not cynical political grandstanding.
I live in California so I know how bluevoters will justify in their minds that the government did the best it could under the circumstances and then deflect to some vague barely related sin by a Republican. That’s why Rs should be pointing out NOW and loudly that the Democrats in Hawaii let their people burn, and the people themselves should not be stuck with the bill for that while bureaucrats and execs get off without accountability. Do it in the moment when it is fresh and will stick in peoples’ memories. Rs are such wussies about this.
I cannot grasp the idea that police kept people from leaving. It’s unimaginable — law enforcement intentionally stopping people from fleeing a fire. How can that be true? Who made that decision, and why on earth? I am hoping it’s not true, just another fog-of-war rumor — but it sounds as if it IS true. Just staggering and too awful for words.
I found this timeline from a local Honolulu newspaper. If you read it while following along with something like Google maps, you’ll see a lot of confusing information as the island fought two wildfires about 20 miles apart. I found it frustrating because you read some decent emergencies management alerts for the first fire in Upcounty that they aren’t given for Lahaina.
https://www.staradvertiser.com/2023/08/20/hawaii-news/reports-offer-a-window-into-terrifying-events-of-maui-fire/
Based on the timeline, it seems a power line came down around 5:15 am that provided the spark in Lahaina. By 3pm, explosions were occurring, I think I read previously this was gas stations. At 4:45p, a county press release advises residents on “the west side” to shelter in place, while first hand reports of survivors show residents going door to door telling people to get out. By 6pm, the boats in the harbor were on fire and a Coast Guard cutter was plucking people from the sea. That suggests within 13 hours, the entire town was aflame from the inland town bypass road to the sea.
Presume that, to make this happen, we need a moron in disaster prep, a moron in charge of water, and morons in charge of the power company. If each chance of having a moron in charge is one in ten, then the likelihood of having all three–necessary–is one over ten times one over ten times one over ten, or one in a thousand. And to have that unlikelihood coincide with a particularly windy season…maybe another ten.
So, one in ten thousand. Most people, even those who haven’t studied statistics, have a gut-level view of probability. If you need a one in ten thousand chance to cause some catastrophe which bids fair to benefit those in a position to …cause stuff, then maybe chance isn’t the answer. In fact, you’d start getting skepticism from most folks about one in seven, or less.
If, on the other hand, you speculate that moronity is a permanent given, no previous effups having changed The Way We Do Things Around Here, that raises other questions.
But the number of people who will be willing to believe this was just a bit of bad luck–stuff happens–clean as a hound’s tooth of any nefarious inputs will be, I submit, quite low.
bisson, is like cable guy nagin, but he hasn’t been indicted yet, like some of the players but not the mayor of san juan
The people who want to “regulate the planetary climate” and demand the power and resources to do so are those who have proven themselves incapable of competently managing and running closed, man-made systems. They cannot competently run power grids, or municipal water systems or trash pickup; they cannot competently maintain, let alone repair, the “roads and bridges” they are always going on about; they cannot competently run or maintain the public housing they increasingly want people to live in, or the public transportation systems they want people to rely on.
More than that; they cannot competently direct disaster recovery/relief from floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, droughts, wildfires, volcanic eruptions or earthquakes — let alone control or prevent such disasters.
Yet they want people to believe that they can, and should, be permitted to try and regulate the planetary climate, which is infinitely more subtle and varied and complex than any of the recently-built, closed, man-made systems they have already repeatedly proven incapable of managing.
https://apnews.com/article/hawaii-lahaina-wildfire-warnings-sirens-chaos-f4bb9bb77c093ac8ff16440b54ade4a6
Why should the Democrats do anything? Hawaii will forever vote dem.
well once upon a time, it voted republican, that was in the first election after statehood,
Wonderful post Erasmus
Incompetence is not unique to the Maui officials.
https://freebeacon.com/latest-news/watch-biden-dhs-chief-brags-maui-wildfires-response-involves-cultural-sensitivity-experts/
Remarks on Biden’s visit to Maui today.
They are not complimentary.
https://redstate.com/nick-arama/2023/08/21/biden-makes-remarks-in-maui-n2162877
‘Biden Botches Remarks in Maui, Tells Jokes, and Appears to Zone out”
M. Kaleo Manuel—Hawaiian Studies major; credentialed (master’s level) urban/regional planner; one of two hundred inaugural “Obama Leaders,” representing the Asia-Pacific region with the Obama Foundation; and (now former) Deputy Director of Hawaii’s Commission on Water Resource Management—does appear to be a loathsome twit who was not qualified to do what his job actually entailed.
That said, it’s not clear that his releasing the water to the reservoir in West Maui would have made any difference, since the water would have had to be dropped by helicopter, and strong winds had created unsafe flying conditions. We should also remember that his smug remarks about “equity” were made some time ago, during a Zoom forum.
Manuel is such an assclown that making his pretty mug the face of this clusterf*ck is almost irresistible. But it’s really not fair, given the degree of gross incompetence in the governmental response to the catastrophe. It was Hanlon’s Razor all the way down.
James S. wrote: “For wildfire-fighting purposes, would it have been feasible to set up a system to pump from the inexhaustible seawater at hand, esp. if there is local concern about preserving freshwater resources? Or would the salt content do more harm than good (although the good could be saving lives)? I believe that ship-based systems would pump seawater to save the ship and crew.”
My small coastal county’s volunteer firemen routinely pump saltwater from canals to fight fires in remote canal subdivisions where there are no hydrants.
Who gave the order to barricade the exit, and why?
And who gave the order for this other obstruction in the middle of the inferno:
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2023/08/17/maui-wildfire-survivors-claim-hawaiian-electric-utility-trucks-blocked-passage-to-safety-n2627171
The disaster is on going. What took place before and during the fire is nothing compared to what will happen in the next few years.
My personal experiences on this island over the past 4 decades tell me that little will change, and that the people who suffered, and are suffering the most, working people, will be screwed.
I won’t go over the terrible response-lets just say that most people i know, whether in Kula, or Lahaina, have yet to see or talk to a fed , state, or county person.
Everything that has been done, has happened with locals, buying food, transporting it, often by boat, and housing people burnt out of their homes
The feds, county and state have failed beyond belief-
No one cares what biden has to say. He is an idiot, and remains one-he could care less about working people.
An interesting utube channel, run by a realtor, of all people, is actually good at bring you up to speed on that has happened, and what is happening.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWAQOn3s9fw
Communication has been a major issue. There has been none. The mayor and all the officials tell the news one thing, and people here on the ground just shake their heads- the reality of what is happening is very different from the news you see.
No one here thinks the death toll will remain at 115. It will easily move over 500.
Most of the people who died, were incinerated in their cars or homes.
Hale Mahaolu, the senior home, was burnt down. Most of the people there are 75 to 80+. No ability to stand the insane smoke and temps and fire that came on them with warning.
I posted earlier about the sadness that is deep here. It is still here, but people, by the next day, were going to costco, putting things on boats, and transfering it island style, with jet skis, boogie boards, and just standing in the surf handing off things to the beach.
One thing that is common to all disasters is the lack of communication, the fed and states inability to talk to local people, and their belief that they(officials) know it all.
Hawaii people have voted Dem since statehood. why I don’t know, and I”ve tired to have conversations to understand it.
anyway. the result is that locals did all the work of actually feeding people, the maui food bank included. they had to avoid cops, fema, and the state to do that. The above link I showed, tells the story of a realtor who wasn’t burnt out, but lives near by. Just got power. In the meantime, he got a Starlink, and set up service on the west side, free to anyone. Like most people on that side, he went to costco, home depot etc. bought gas, propane, gas cans etc.
It has been a real Sh88show here. and it will get much much worse.
Hawaiins have a pipe dream of recreating the kingdom of hawaii, and the state wants to do away with building codes that kept Lahaina looking the way it did. In the end, they will displace most of the people, by eminent domain or what ever the term is, and house workers in apt blocks.
It will be a brutal fight, but it will happen. I’ve watched the county and state screw things up before. this time it will be the death of most of this island.
Disney land for the rich. the rest of us can’t afford to live here anymore. progress??
The last time I posted here I felt pessimistic. Nothing I have seen in the last weeks has changed that outlook.
James S on August 21, 2023 at 5:56 pm said:
For wildfire-fighting purposes, would it have been feasible to set up a system to pump from the inexhaustible seawater at hand, esp. if there is local concern about preserving freshwater resources?
Good question. Avalon on Catalina Island has a saltwater system for sewage, or did have. About 50 years ago, they decided to go all fresh water because the salt corroded fixtures. Then came the 1977 drought and they went back to salt water. I don’t know if they kept it. It would make a lot of sense in Lahaina.
More to mull over:
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/08/buried_news_what_was_with_that_hawaii_water_official_getting_showered_with_leis_from_supporters.html
Sure, be culturally sensitive, but the real story has to be whether you’re effective and get the job done. How did that get turned on its head?
@ Mike Plaiss > “The Bhopal disaster is often singled out as quintessential corporate evil. Except that it wasn’t.”
Thanks for that link; if you posted it before, I missed it.
It was “very appropriate to this post” indeed.
Especially these parts:
Hubris destroyed the town and caused many needless deaths. That should be the story. The people in charge did not take seriously the risk of fire and the need for long term plans and practice for fire mitigation, fire response and town evacuation.
Many more Americans are dead and will die because government is populated by lazy, foolish people and American culture accepts that as ok
Hawaii’s corrupt and do nothing government has been a running joke for decades. But this is different – the incompetence was just a matter of money before, what we call the ‘Paradise Tax’ was paid in a lower standard of living and services, not lives.
This has gone very deep and may actually lead to some political change. A ‘Born Blue’ friend who resides in Wailea (15 miles south of Lahaina), and who’s sister almost lost her home to the Kula fire, actually described it as ‘a failure of government at every level’. An astonishing admission.
Another friend, retired from Honolulu FD, told us Lahaina only had two engines and NO tanker truck. Can you believe this? The second biggest tourist town in the state and no auxiliary water supply for fire fighting! We have the highest tax burden in the nation – but no tanker truck for Lahaina!
And the idea that seawater could be used for fire fighting? Well, that would take imagination, planning and initiative – something the incompetence that inevitably follows on corruption precludes.
My town on Oahu is a mini Lahaina, once a backwater sugar town, now a tourist magnet. A main street with old wooden buildings, bordered on one side with ocean and the other with former sugar cane fields gone to cali grass. One way in, one way out and it could go up in a flash just like Lahaina. There are towns like this all over the state. Believe me, people are feeling vulnerable in a way they never felt before.
One bright spot, while idling in traffic on the way to the post office today I saw a HECO truck parked at the war memorial. A young man in a shiny new hard hat and field jacket – clip board in hand – was looking up at the power lines and taking notes. Maybe somebody at HECO is working on a plan.
I wonder how many brush trucks the fire departments on the island had? Structure fire trucks are not very useful in brush fires, as they are two wheel drives, meant for road use.
Here in Wisconsin, every fire department has at least one brush truck, and most have a large general purpose pumper, on a 4X4 chassis. We are fortunate that Seagrave, Pierce, Darley, and OSHKOSH are all based here.
I think the fellow who failed to order the emergency sirens used had a passable explanation for his conduct. The deputy of his who dragged his feet about diverting water supplies should be punished brutally. If the police actually did block the roads and the roads blocked were not leading into the fire, brutal punishment for the officers in charge as well.
==
While we’re at it, in a sane world, the antitrust authorities would be all over Blackrock like white on rice.
I’m old enough to remember that “Bush hates black people,” just because he happened to be president at the same time that local Democrats in New Orleans similarly botched a disaster response.
Does Biden hate Hawaiian islanders? Compare and contrast his behavior with Bush’s during Katrina.
The system really is rigged.
Scott the Badger:
But is all that equipment and are those vehicles electric, or does use green renewable fuel? Yet the dead are still not fully tallied. The priorities of our betters are on greater problems than people’s lives; the climate social justice, …..
The God of Copybook Headings.
yes that was when I really disdained kanye and spike lee, and aaron mcgruder, even though he was new on the scene,
the ones who hold his eye, want to make climate change, a real excuse,
there’s even a greater irony, he was staying at the home of tom steyer, the banker who made his money on dirty indonesian coal, much like arianna huffington’s nest egg was the oil her father in law, made in that archipelago,
our lesuo overlord
https://twitter.com/WarlordDilley/status/1693953618641109205
So these two guys, the water manager and the emergency services official are the inevitable result of the ignorance (certainly at times willful) and the mendacity at the top of Big Climate. The so called leaders of the climate movement, in government, education, and foundations either lie all the time or are not smart enough to do their own investigation into what is happening with the climate and what we can do about it. So all the way down the line to these local officials no one has the sense to question the veracity of the people above them.
And what really enrages me about green energy, especially wind power is that all you need to do is to able to add. Then you’ll realize that green energy is a pipe dream. Every conversion I’ve seen regarding the climate change narrative from pro-green to pro-traditional energy occurs when someone does the addition and realizes that wind can’t produce enough reliable energy to get anywhere near net-zero.
So they’re lying or stupid since they won’t become advocates for nuclear energy. Which is the only way really cut down on CO2 emissions. That is, without immiserating billions of people.
So to you members of the Church of the Global Warming Apocalypse, which do want? Death to hundreds of millions of people or nuclear energy?
The Church of the Global Warming Catastrophy have publicly stated that there are too many people.
I guess they are toots good with the Thelma and Louise scenario (h/t Davemay) as long as it is an electric vehicle.
Mike K…the Maui power company is owned by Hawaiian Electric.
…whose stock price has fallen almost 4:1 since this debacle.
https://seekingalpha.com/symbol/HE
Much if not most of Blackrock’s ownership is in the form of funds which really belong to the fund investors, but are voted by Blackrock.
Hawaii wildfires: The red Lahaina house that survived Maui fires
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66575234
and … ‘You’re kind of raised to hate tourists’: Maui fires fan tensions on Hawaiian island
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66507019
Jim Irvine on August 21, 2023 at 10:34 pm
Interesting post. Jim provides one answer to my thought, up top. Starlink comms. Sounds expensive, and not terribly wide spread.
I haven’t kept track of this stuff, but I recall that this concept of thousands of low earth orbit satellites providing internet service to any point on the planet began as the corp. named Teledesic, which I presume is defunct or possibly bought out by Starlink.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#/media/File:Steve_Jurvetson_with_Starlink_user_terminal.jpg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starlink#/media/File:Michael_Griffin_Meets_with_Elon_Musk.jpg
And the Hawaiian electric company, just like PG&E in California,
Quite likely the Hawaiian electric company, just like PG&E in California, had been commanded by shortsighted governing parties to divert income to green virtue-signaling, thereby short-changing things like maintenance and removing flammables from proximity to power lines.
There is a clip of a guy who claimed that they were fighting the fire effectively with water, the water supply was turned off, and that prevented them from fighting the fire. He also state fire trucks were not able to refill due to this.
“I think the fellow who failed to order the emergency sirens used had a passable explanation for his conduct.”
The state’s official description indicates the sirens are also for fires. They should also be able to send out texts to everyone with directions. And use radio and tv.
Quite likely the Hawaiian electric company, just like PG&E in California, had been commanded by shortsighted governing parties to divert income to green virtue-signaling, thereby short-changing things like maintenance and removing flammables from proximity to power lines.
True, but the companies are almost part of government at this point. Government likes being able to blame them, but they are very much intermeshed.
Effing Greenie bureaucrats living on the taxpayer’s dime. Hawai’i taxpayers are delusional Greenies also. Hawai’i is such a remarkable collection of left-wing nut jobs.
I fear there are untold #s of kids whose bodies were destroyed by the raging grass fire and cannot be identified, leaving no trace.
The lazy, irresponsive bureaucrats should be taken out and set on fire themselves.
Am I angry? Duh!
Cicero:
They might need a one on one with Pele, he is on the Big Island (Hawaii) now.
Om,
Pele’s pronouns are she/her.
And she’s everywhere. So keep a bottle of gin handy and careful picking up a hitchhiker late at night!
Art,
The siren excuse is BS. Those sirens are for any kind of emergency. I have had them pull me out of bed for hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis and the occasional North Korean missile.* In the old days when the sirens went off we would turn on the tv or radio to find out what to expect and take appropriate preparation, now it comes across our phones.
*When the missile alert came through I told my husband; ‘Bet it’s just some idiot that pushed the wrong button, I’m going back to sleep.’ And of course it was.
I’m in complete agreement with you regarding Blackrock, Vanguard, etc. and an anti trust action. Or RICO, as their pressuring business into non productive expenditures seems like it could fall under the definition of extortion.
Om, Madison has an electric pumper. The pump on board is diesel powered. The alternator on the diesel can apparently charge the battery, as engine pumps the water.
Madison think.
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