2023-08-15 01:18:50
The death toll from the Hawaii fires, the deadliest in more than a century in the United States, is likely to double or triple this week, authorities have warned, expecting to find ‘ten to 20’ bodies a day as ‘they are currently being criticized for their handling of the drama.
These fires, of exceptional intensity and speed, killed 96 people on the island of Maui, according to the latest provisional report published Sunday evening. But sniffer dogs currently scouring the rubble of the nearly blazed town of Lahaina still have plenty of ground to cover.
According to Hawaii Governor Josh Green, the search operations will last “probably another ten days”. The final balance sheet is currently “impossible to guess”, he explained in an interview broadcast Monday by the CBS channel.
As the death toll in Hawaii from the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century grew to 96 on Sunday, Hawaii Gov. Josh Green said there is a grim expectation of further casualties. https://t.co/IqcGm1yrl2
— CBS News (@CBSNews) August 14, 2023
In this historic city of 12,000 inhabitants, former capital of the Kingdom of Hawaii, the fire was so intense that it melted the metal. The corpses are unrecognizable and the police are calling on the relatives of missing persons to do a DNA test, to facilitate the identification of the victims.
The authorities still identify 1,300 missing people, according to the governor. A figure that is falling as communications are gradually restored on Maui and residents are able to locate their loved ones.
Crisis management criticized
The circumstances of these dazzling fires, the cause of which is not yet known, remain unclear. They took the population by surprise, which many blame the authorities for. “Do you want to know when we knew there was a fire? When he arrived in front of the house! Vilma Reed told AFP. Like many residents, she received neither alert nor evacuation order, due to a series of anomalies.
VIDEO. “There was no alert, no evacuation order”, denounce the survivors
The sirens, used in particular for tsunamis, remained silent. Official alerts on television, radio and telephones were useless for residents without electricity or network. An investigation was opened to examine the crisis management.
The electricity supplier targeted by a complaint
Hawaiian elected official Jill Tokuda has already acknowledged that the authorities had “underestimated the dangerousness and the speed of the fire”. Mazie Hirono, Democratic Senator for the Archipelago, said on CNN not wanting to “seek to find excuses for this tragedy”. Electricity supplier Hawaiian Electric is also the subject of a complaint.
Residents blame the company for “inexcusably keeping its power lines live when forecasts predicted a high risk of fire” and strong winds, fed by a hurricane passing southwest of Maui, likely to knock down electric poles.
A summer of extreme weather events on the planet
The very strong winds and the drought that Maui is currently suffering from have largely contributed to the rapid spread of the multiple fires suffered by the island last week, and which are still burning despite the efforts of firefighters to contain them.
They come amid a summer marked by extreme weather events around the planet, linked to global warming according to experts, including an intense heat wave in the southern United States and mega wildfires in Canada. Faced with the extent of the damage, US President Joe Biden said he was considering traveling to Hawaii.
Feed and house the survivors
In addition to the search for the bodies, the other challenge of Maui is now to feed and house the thousands of survivors. In Kahului, on the north coast of the island, several renowned chefs have taken over the university kitchen and now prepare 9,000 meals a day, helped by an army of volunteers.
“Some of our cooks lost their homes (in the fire) and they are here with us, cooking for the people,” Sheldon Simeon, famed Hawaiian food ambassador, told AFP. “It gives you an idea of what it is, this aloha spirit. »
Volunteers load pallets of supplies and aid donations from the Hawaiian island of Kauai for Lahaina survivors. AFP/Patrick T. Fallon. AFP or licensors
According to the governor, an accommodation program mobilizing 500 hotel rooms is now operational to accommodate the survivors of the fire. The authorities are also working to transform Airbnb accommodation into accommodation. The reconstruction will take a long time. The cost of the Lahaina fire alone is estimated at $5.52 billion by federal authorities.
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