As Search Continues, Maui Residents Critical of Firefighters' Response

Matthias Gafni

San Francisco Chronicle

(TNS)

Aug. 17—LAHAINA, Hawaii — Dominga Advincula grabbed her keys and bag and was about to head to her resort job around 6:45 a.m. on Aug. 8 when she heard a loud boom.

She walked outside into the blustery wind that had already cut power to her neighborhood at the top of Lahainaluna Road, east of downtown Lahaina. That's when, she said, she spotted the source of the explosion — a blown transformer now raining sparks onto the dry Lahaina hillside.

"It was like fireworks," the 55-year-old said in an interview with the Chronicle on Wednesday.

As the hill caught fire, Advincula grabbed her phone and called 911. She woke her husband, 89-year-old father-in-law, two brothers-in-law and son. They collected the three children in the home (ages 8 months, 2 years and 7 years) and a dog, and jumped into cars to evacuate.

More than a week later, authorities have not released an official cause for the deadly Lahaina fire that as of Thursday had killed at least 111 people and damaged or destroyed more than 2,200 homes, businesses and other structures.

But Advincula and others in a neighborhood on the east side of town report that the damaged electrical system started the fire that morning, with one neighbor capturing a video of a downed power line igniting grass.

And they say there was no reason that the initial fire should have led to so much tragedy. They don't understand why firefighters doused the small conflagration but then abandoned it later that morning, calling it contained — an action that appears to have allowed it to reignite.

"If they could wait an hour or 30 minutes ... that small fire in the afternoon? They could've saved everybody else," Advincula said. "Why did they leave?"

Bobby Lee, the president of the Hawaii Fire Fighters Association labor union, told Honolulu Civil Beat that many of the island's firefighters ended up battling two other fires roughly an hour away, in Upcountry and southern Maui.

"But when you look at what was going on, it looks like they were tapped out," Lee said. "They were overwhelmed. You've got only so many resources."

Maui County officials said the Maui Fire Department responded to a brush fire in the Lahaina hillside community at 6:37 a.m. and immediately ordered evacuations for the area. Fire crews responded from Napili, Lahaina and Kihei, about 25 miles south.

At about 6:46 a.m., Erika Pless woke her boyfriend, Dylan Medina, after she spotted the fire across the street.

Medina, an artist from the Bay Area who has lived at the top of Lahainaluna Road since 2018, is a neighbor of Shane Treu, who posted a video on Facebook capturing arcing wires igniting grass along Lahainaluna Road.

"Frickin' power line just went down," Treu says in the video.

Unlike Pacific Gas and Electric Co. in Northern California, the power company that serves Maui, Hawaiian Electric, does not have a program to preemptively deactivate down lines during times of high fire risk.

Medina said the flames were 15 feet above the fence line across the street and spreading downhill, driven by intense winds that would rip shingles off roofs in the neighborhood. He saw more flames in a field about 300 yards away.

The couple loaded their car and evacuated.

The county's Facebook post said that, around 9 a.m. that day, the fire "was declared 100% contained" after it blackened roughly three acres. County officials added that "winds in the area are a concern" and said the National Weather Service had issued a high-wind warning that would remain through the next day.

Also around 9 a.m., Medina and Pless returned briefly to their house. They said the wind had picked up.

"Coming up the hill, the wind was blowing dirt across the street," Medina said.

Arriving home, he said he saw a "completely downed power pole and power line ripped out and exposed." He said he saw a single fire truck driving around the neighborhood.

The pair then drove to southern Maui.

Advincula returned around 10 a.m. to her house on Kuia Luia Street, a block west of Medina's home. She said she and her husband spotted firefighters spraying hot spots on the nearby hillside.

With the power out, she said, the family hung out and snacked on nuts. They were more worried at that time about their roof being damaged by the wind, she said.

Between 1 and 2 p.m., she said, the family members watched the remaining firefighters leave through their window. Her husband began to get worried, she said, as the wind howled outside.

Within an hour or so of the last fire truck leaving, Advincula said she spotted smoke behind a neighbor's house.

"There's the smoke again!" she recalled yelling to her family members.

They jumped into their cars and evacuated a second time. Advincula and her son drove to her cousin's house in downtown Lahaina.

The smoke downhill, near Paunau Street, got darker. Advincula's son sensed trouble.

"Mom, I feel the heat," she recalled him saying. "We need to leave."

They drove north to the Lahaina Civic Center through thick black smoke and downed power lines, ultimately surviving the deadly fire that would consume most of the town over the next several hours.

The family's house atop the hillside would also remain standing. However, Advincula's cousin, Antonia Molina, is missing, she said.

The county would later explain over Facebook that an "apparent flareup" of the fire occurred around 3:30 p.m., after crews had left to fight a fire elsewhere.

Advincula and many Maui residents are now asking the same question: If firefighters knew the winds were strong, why did they leave the fire on the east side of Lahaina so soon?

"Couldn't they just spare one truck for two more hours?" she asked.

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