August 11, 2023 Maui wildfire news

Speaking with CNN’s Amara Walker on CNN This Morning on Saturday, Rep. Jill Tokuda (D-Hawaii) said the state “underestimated the lethality, the quickness of fire,” and failed to plan for redundancies in its emergency alert system.

Tokuda said these days, emergency alerts are received on cell phones, but that there was no cell phone coverage in the area at the time.

“It’s not like hurricane force winds are unknown to Hawaii, or dry brush, or red flag conditions. We saw this before in (Hurricane) Lane. We did not learn our lesson from Lane (in 2018) — that brush fires could erupt as a result of churning hurricane winds below us to the south,” Tokuda said. “We have got to make sure that we do better.”

In 2018, as Hurricane Lane approached Hawaii, bush fires scorched a total of 2,330 acres in Maui. The following year, fires in Maui burned around 25,000 acres and yet, in a report last year, Hawaii’s emergency management agency described the risk of wildfires to human life as “low.”

As officials await FEMA searches inside buildings for any additional victims, Tokuda said the oceans around Lahaina will also have to be dredged, “to make sure that every individual that is lost is found.”

The Congresswoman said she understands residents expect actions from lawmakers, saying “we need to be there to help them as they rebuild back. It’s going to take years, generations.”