knocks people down. that knocked down power poles. and from witnesses, we ve heard that when power poles went down, that s where sparks started and with really high hurricane force just moving through, that s where the fire spread so quickly gusts moving through. it was the perfect storm. lahaina has been devastated before in a similar fashion but never to this extent of course, but with a hurricane that is not even making landfall, just moving by the island and a really tight pressure gradient and the combination of how dry it is in many parts of maui but particularly through the areas where the fires were sparked so it s definitely a concern but we couldn t have predicted just how bad this was. we couldn t have predicted ust how bad this wasi how bad this was. malika dudley. how bad this was. malika dudley, thank how bad this was. malika dudley, thank you - how bad this was. malika dudley, thank you so - how bad this was. malika l dudley, thank you so much how bad this was. m
we have the capability of doing it ourselves, but if it you can imagine the department s limitation is, you know, one building. this is a whole village, many structures that need to be searched. it s going to take some time. we have learned about the communications problems that, to get speaking to people in the hotel zones and on the western side of the city. it must be even as the mayor describes it, impossible to get a count of how many people are missing, to do the job when you can t even communicate with the parts of the island? that is so true. the communication, you know, earlier when we were talking about the evacuation of the people and you take into consideration the winds that were coming through there and the power poles, the tirlutilit
rise. william? charles, the reason why is because the governor says that the victims found or located so far were actually found outside buildings. i can tell you, having been to lahaina, they are now inspecting some of those very tight, old wooden structures, in lahaina. there are multiple search teams now in maui that arrived from the mainland to come along with cadaver dogs, that are going to go through the 1700 structures the governor said the fire destroyed. people are found in houses, huddled, holding each other because the fire surrounded their homes before they could even get i would. there was nowhere to go. these are beautiful holds, homey old, made of wood. nobody had warning. now some questions are being raised, charles, about why officials did not sound the islands tsunami alert to warn residents when the winds, 60-70 miles per hour, toppled power poles. we spoke to two survivors who
and the governor said that the community of lahina is gone. reporter: i am here in front of the school that was established in 1913, and as you can see behind me, it is completely destroyed by the fire. nothing left. everything has burned from the fence to the roof to the structures and then looking at this way, it is front street, and it is completely unrecognizable, and power poles are down, and power poles as well, and on the right is the eyep bell tree is down as well, and people tell me that this area will not quite the same. i went out on a boat to survey the devastation.
fires. then lahaina also had a fire. so if you can imagine just how the resources had to be spread out. 100 firefighters were on duty for 24 hours. and that was calling all hands on deck. at the time, it seem it was overwhelming. it seemed like we really didn t have the help that we needed. now fast forward to yesterday. we started to get help from the national government, the federal government, and i think that has really helped. the winds have come down a little bit, so that also helped with the fire-fighting effort. what i m hearing from people and if you can imagine in lahaina, 29 power poles went down. so the winds blew the power poles down, the power poles this is my personal opinion because obviously there have not been investigations done yet on the cause of the fire. but when a power pole comes down, it sparks, and we ve heard this from witnesses, as well.