36 dead in hawai
At least 36 people have been killed in Maui County as wildfires sweep across parts of the island, county officials said late Wednesday.
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Among the most devastated areas: Much of the western Maui community of Lahaina, where about 12,000 people live, is destroyed and hundreds of families there have been displaced, Hawaii Gov. Josh Green said. More than 270 structures have been impacted in Lahaina, county officials said. In addition to the homes and businesses that were wiped out, the toll on historical and cultural sites in Lahaina has been devastating, a CNN analysis of new Maxar Technologies satellite imagery shows. The images, taken at 11:03 a.m. local time Wednesday, show that one of the largest banyan trees in the US – the size of an entire city block and more than 60 feet high – has been burnt. It was imported from India in 1873, Hawaii’s Tourism Authority says.
Some are unaccounted for: Three helicopters from the US Coast Guard and US Navy were used in search and rescue efforts along the west Maui coastline, and a federal team arrived Wednesday to help search efforts in the Lahaina area, officials said.
Cell service out for thousands in Maui: It could take days or even weeks to fix networks. Officials have been using satellite phones to communicate with providers on the west side of Maui to restore power to the area, Lt. Gov. Sylvia Luke said. Emergency and evacuation response efforts have been hampered by widespread cell service outages, which have prevented people from calling 911 or updating loved ones about their status, according to authorities.
Power outages: More than 11,000 customers on Maui were without power as of 11 p.m. Wednesday local time (5 a.m. ET Thursday), according to PowerOutage.us, accounting for about 15% of the island’s customers. Power crews are working to repair downed lines and additional crews are being deployed from Oahu, Hawaiian Electric said in a news release.
Many in shelters: More than 2,100 people were in four emergency shelters in Maui on Tuesday night, the mayor’s office said. While there’s enough shelter for an emergency response for a few days, “there’s not enough shelter for long term living,” the governor told CNN.
Per CNN article