11 August 2023 , 20:15
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A man who's home was ravaged by the Maui fires has shared his despair at his father's now being 'just on the ground with all the other ashes'.
Dad of two Kimo Kirkman said his dad's ashes were his "prized possession" but they perished in the Hawaii fires, along with his the rest of their home. Thankfully his two daughters came out alive.
He told NBC news: “I wanted to hold on to it forever. Now he’s just in the ground with all the other ashes. And that was probably the toughest. That was my only prized possession. That was it. You know, all the other stuff was, that didn’t mean anything.”
Kirkman and his wife, Steffani, were not in Lahaina when the fire, fueled by high winds, swept through the town located in the west of the island Tuesday.
Kimo and Steffani's youngest daughter narrowly escaped the blaze by fleeing to the highway (NBC News)Their youngest daughter, a keen surfer, who was in the area at the time, contemplated jumping into the Pacific Ocean to escape the blaze. She managed to escape onto the highway and get out safely. Their other daughter was out of town when the blaze took hold.
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The US Coast Guard was forced to rescue several people from the ocean who had jumped in as a last resort. The Kirkam family's dogs have not been seen since and are feared dead. The couple said they were praying that the animals died peacefully from smoke inhalation.
The death toll has now risen to 55. Governor Josh Green said the death toll will likely rise further as search and rescue operations continue.
The wildfires are the state’s deadliest natural disaster since a 1960 tsunami killed 61 people (County of Maui/ZUMA Press Wire/REX/Shutterstock)Maui residents who escaped have asked why Hawaii’s emergency sirens did not alert them as the flames raced toward their homes. Hawaii emergency management records show no indication that the warning system was triggered before a devastating wildfire wiped out the historic town of Lahaina, officials confirmed.
Hawaii boasts what the state describes as the largest single outdoor all-hazard public safety warning system in the world, with about 400 sirens positioned across the island chain.
But many of Lahaina’s survivors said they did not hear any sirens and only realised they were in danger when they saw flames or heard explosions nearby. Fuelled by a dry summer and strong winds from a passing hurricane, the fire started on Tuesday and took Maui by surprise, racing through parched brush covering the island and then flattening homes and anything else that lay in its path.
The hall of historic Waiola Church in Lahaina and nearby Lahaina Hongwanji Mission are engulfed in flames along Wainee Street on Tuesday, Aug. 8 (AP)The wildfires are the state’s deadliest natural disaster since a 1960 tsunami killed 61 people. Governor Josh Green said: “The recovery is going to be extraordinarily complicated, but we do want people to get back to their homes and just do what they can to assess safely because it’s pretty dangerous,” he told Hawaii News Now.
“Lahaina, with a few rare exceptions, has been burned down,” Mr Green said after walking the ruins of the town with Maui Mayor Richard Bissen. “Without a doubt, it feels like a bomb was dropped on Lahaina.”