Welcome to the lead, aim jake tapper. And we start with breaking news, violent and explosive wildfires in hawaii. Fueled by strong winds from a hurricane, 800 miles away. It is a situation so sudden and so catastrophic on maui, local Officials Say a dozen people ran into the ocean to try to escape the flames. And they went out so far they then had to be rescued. Hawaiis governor said hundreds of families have been displaced and some loss of life is expected, unquote. Cell towers and 911 are out of service on the the hardhit west side compounding the difficulty for many. Were expecting a Press Conference and well bring you that when it starts but Derek Van Damme looked at where this erratic disaster may be headed next. Reporter hellish scenes of wildfires engulfing normally picturesque maui. Powerful winds, associated with Hurricane Dora helping fuel the flames. Fact that we have wildfire in multiple areas as a result of indirectly from a hurricane is unprecedented. Reporter Lieutenant
according to one report, their 1014 kidnap sing kidnappings hai from january to june fish ts year. y people died in a migrant shipwreck dear near the italian island. the migrant boat left several ds ago and 45 people, including children, were on board when the boat capsized after being hit by a big wave. within an hour of departing tunisia, this is just the latest strategy amid a spike of people making the dangerous sea crossing from northern africa to europe. according to the italian government, 93,754 refugees have arrived in italy by boat this year. the united nations estimates more than 1800 refugees have been reported dead and missing so far this year. several developments where
thank the lieutenant governor as well as the attorney the acting general for arranging this joint press conference. we know there is a lot of interest in what is going on in our county and i would like to update everyone. as a result of three fires that have occurred, that are continuing here on our island, we have had 13 evacuations from different neighborhoods and towns, we ve had 16 road closures. we ve opened five shelters. and we ve, as a result of that, our west side of our island law hina area was cut off. only one road was able to be traveled in and out. power was out to 2,628 customers. there is no power at our hotels. or even at the shelters that we opened up.
we don t have that exact number just yet. again, we re still in the assessment phase this morning. now that we have light, so i don t want to take a guess at the number. but it is quite, it is going to be a high number. power is still out in that part of the island. there were 29 or 30 poles that were down. 29 in lahaina itself. so we have not been able to restore that to get a better idea and the fire is still going on. our next question is from we ve been listening to an update from officials in hawaii as maui deals with devastating wildfires. the mayor of maui county announced that six people have been killed in the wildfires and search and rescue efforts are still underway. they have trouble getting helicopters up yesterday but they are up today. officials also say hospitals are
powerful winds, associated with hurricane dora helping fuel the flames. fact that we have wildfire in multiple areas as a result of indirectly from a hurricane is unprecedented. reporter: lieutenant governor silvia luke issued an emergency proclamation on tuesday. governor josh green has been out of state but it returned tonight. it has turned very serious and very dire. reporter: she said the hospitals on the island are overwhelmed with burn patients and people suffering from smoke inhalation. and also 911 cell and phone services are down, complicating evacuations. the maui county has not been able to communicate with residents on the west side, so we re dealing with because we re an island state, in addition to dealing with the disaster, we re dealing with major transportation issues as well. reporter: right now emergency