The Maui fires are the deadliest in the U.S. in the last 100 years, with officials warning the death toll -- now more than 100 -- will increase. As the island works to recover from the disaster, groups in the Chicago area have organized two major relief efforts set to take place Wednesday.
The Northern Illinois Food Bank is set to begin sending 41 pallets of dry goods from ALDI, in Partnership with Feeding America Wednesday morning. Additionally, United Airlines at 4 p.m. Wednesday plans to send an aircraft carrying 24,000 pounds of supplies -- including baby formula, baby care kits, canned goods, hygiene kits and more -- to Kahului Airport.
According to officials, the passenger plane will make a stop in Denver before heading to the island, and will return with hundreds of people who have been stranded in Maui since the disaster struck.
Ways you can help
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The Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement is matching donations of up to $1.5 million and says that 100% of the proceeds will go to Maui organizations supporting relief efforts. It also provides a list of needed goods, including baby supplies, first aid, bedding and blankets and other items.
The Hawaii Community Foundation is seeking monetary donations for the Maui Strong Fund.100% of the money will go toward community needs.
Maui United Way is seeking donations for fire disaster relief. It says it will provide direct relief to families and nonprofits affected by the fire.
GoFundMe has set up a page of Maui fire relief fundraisers that its team has verified. The fundraisers are for families and individuals who lost their homes and other belongings in the fire or who were otherwise affected. GoFundMe will add more fundraisers as they are verified.
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The Maui Food Bank is looking for monetary donations as well donations of food and other supplies.
The Maui Humane Society is seeking donations as it provides pet supplies and emergency kits to shelters so that people and pets can stay together. Veterinarians and other professionals are volunteering at the shelters and other spots.
The American Red Cross is raising money for its relief efforts. More than 200 of its trained disaster workers — from Maui, other Hawaiian islands and elsewhere in the country — are helping and others are on their way, it says. It has opened shelters, has been providing disaster supplies to evacuees and will begin distributing relief supplies in the hardest hit areas when it is able.
The Center for Disaster Philanthropy has launched a new fund for the Maui wildfires relief. It will support mid- to long-term recovery in Maui and other islands that are affected. It says its focus, as usual, will be to provide grants to local organizations that support marginalized people to work toward an equitable recovery.
It suggests considering the support of local organizations that have flexible funding, that work to prevent or minimize the effects of future disasters, that promote practices for mitigating wildfires and droughts and living with climate change and support the economic recovery of small, locally owned and culturally relevant businesses.
Death toll reaches 110
Federal officials sent a mobile morgue with coroners, pathologists and technicians to Hawaii to help identify the dead, as Maui County released the first names of people killed in the wildfire that all but incinerated the historic town of Lahaina a week ago and killed at least 110 people.
A week after the fires started, some residents still had with intermittent power, unreliable cellphone service and uncertainty over where to get assistance.
Some people walked periodically to a seawall, where phone connections were strongest, to make calls. Flying low off the coast, a single-prop airplane used a loudspeaker to blare information about where to get water and supplies.
Just two victims have been named so far, while the county said it has identified three more and will release the names after notifying the next of kin.
“It’s going to be a very, very difficult mission,” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services deputy assistant secretary Jonathan Greene said. “And patience will be incredibly important because of the number of victims.”
A portable morgue unit arrived Tuesday morning with more than 22 tons of supplies and equipment needed for victim identification and processing remains, such as mortuary examination tables and X-ray units.
Crews using cadaver dogs have scoured about 32% of the area, the County of Maui said in a statement Tuesday. The governor asked for patience as authorities became overwhelmed with requests to visit the burn area.
Maui Police Chief John Pelletier renewed an appeal for families with missing relatives to provide DNA samples. So far 41 samples have been submitted, the county statement said, and 13 DNA profiles have been obtained from remains.
The governor warned that scores more bodies could be found. The wildfires, some of which have not yet been fully contained, are already the deadliest in the U.S. in more than a century.
When asked by Hawaii News Now if children are among the missing, Green said Tuesday: “Tragically, yes. ... When the bodies are smaller, we know it's a child.”
He described some of the sites being searched as “too much to share or see from just a human perspective.”
Another complicating factor, Green said, is that storms with rain and high winds were forecast for the weekend. Officials are mulling whether to “preemptively power down or not for a short period of time, because right now all of the infrastructure is weaker.”
The local power utility has already faced criticism for not shutting off power as strong winds buffeted a parched area under high risk for fire. It’s not clear whether the utility’s equipment played any role in igniting the flames.
Hawaiian Electric Co. Inc. President and CEO Shelee Kimura said many factors go into a decision to cut power, including the impact on people who rely on specialized medical equipment and concerns that a shutoff in the fire area would have knocked out water pumps.
Green has said the flames raced as fast as a mile (1.6 kilometers) every minute in one area, fueled by dry grass and propelled by strong winds from a passing hurricane.
The blaze that swept into centuries-old Lahaina last week destroyed nearly every building in the town of 13,000. That fire has been 85% contained, according to the county. Another blaze known as the Upcountry fire was 75% contained as of Tuesday evening.
The Lahaina fire caused about $3.2 billion in insured property losses, according to calculations by Karen Clark & Company, a prominent disaster and risk modeling company. That doesn’t count damage to uninsured property. The firm said more than 2,200 buildings were damaged or destroyed by flames, with about 3,000 damaged by fire or smoke or both.
Even where the flames have retreated, authorities have warned that toxic byproducts may remain, including in drinking water, after the flames spewed poisonous fumes. That has left many unable to return home.
Victoria Martocci, who lost her scuba business and a boat, planned to travel to her storage unit in Kahalui from her Kahana home Wednesday to stash documents and keepsakes given to her by a friend whose house burned. “These are things she grabbed, the only things she could grab, and I want to keep them safe for her,” Martocci said.
President Joe Biden said Tuesday that he and first lady Jill Biden would visit Hawaii “as soon as we can” but he doesn’t want his presence to interrupt recovery and cleanup efforts. During a stop in Milwaukee to highlight his economic agenda, Biden pledged that “every asset they need will be there for them.”
The two victims identified were Lahaina residents Robert Dyckman, 74, and Buddy Jantoc, 79.
Lahaina resident Kekoa Lansford helped rescue people as the flames swept through town. Now he is collecting stories from survivors, hoping to create a timeline of what happened. He has 170 emails so far.
The scene was haunting. “Horrible, horrible," Lansford said Tuesday. "You ever seen hell in the movies? That is what it looked like. Fire everywhere. Dead people.”
