techno-ag said:

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aggiehawg said:

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Me as well, really cool little town and sad to see. These fires happen there for a variety of reasons and always have unfortunately. Summer time things dry up and you have so much vegetation so it can get bad quickly.

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When we there in 2009, visited a fire station. The Hubs being a retired firgihter likes to drop in and meet other firefighters when we are on trips. First off, it was a small substation that didn't really have a lot of equipment, just two trucks in the bay, maybe six guys on duty. All were pretty young and spent a lot of time working out and working on their tans. Then did have a nice workout room.

The Hubs was cross trained during his career, high rise fires, water and dive rescue and aircraft fire rescue etc. Those guys didn't believe him as none of them were. After about 30 minutes of talking shop about how many fires and the type of fires they had made, we left.

Basically, those guys were all a-holes. As we were driving away I asked The Hubs if he would go into a fire with any of them and he said no he wouldn't. That he had probies who were better trained than they were.

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Honestly, most Hawaiians are like that, especially toward outsiders, white outsiders in particular. They like your tourist dollars, but that's where it stops.

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Was there on Front Street two weeks ago

agracer said:

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I don't think people have to take the north road out. The road didn't burn and they can clear debris pretty quickly so cars can get out past Lahaina on the bypass and on 30.

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Per Google Maps and the news, 30 is still closed so the north road is the only way out from Kaanapali or Kapalua

Just reading about this today. This is awful. Maui is a beautiful island, and it's so sad to see so much suffering.

How did Fleetwoods fare in the fires - Micks place is in Front St and has great food and a cool vibe.

Pretty safe to assume that any business in that main area of Front Street is gone.

Big Al 1992 said:

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How did Fleetwoods fare in the fires - Micks place is in Front St and has great food and a cool vibe.

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I saw on twitter that it's gone. Same as cheeseburger in paradise, Kimos, all of it.

pic.twitter.com/biyr3Ji8dO

— Mick Fleetwood (@MickFleetwood) August 10, 2023

JamesE4 said:

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agracer said:

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I don't think people have to take the north road out. The road didn't burn and they can clear debris pretty quickly so cars can get out past Lahaina on the bypass and on 30.

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Per Google Maps and the news, 30 is still closed so the north road is the only way out from Kaanapali or Kapalua

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Says will reopen Aug 12.

A section of the North route out past Kapalua is also closed. I guess those folks are stuck there.

Hawaiian Air had a waiver in place through the 20th. We fly the 26th and are trying to rebook to Kauai. You.can only make changes via phone and to say it's backed up is an understatement.

Will try again Sunday after the immediate weekend fliers are done.

At this point we do not want to add to the problem of too many people coming in and services diminished on top of all the suffering from the locals. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. We have friends going in 9 days. Same condo rental a week apart.

Any word on Cannery Mall and Safeway?

Three years ago we were booked for Lahaina on our ten year anniversary. The whole agenda was planned around the old Luau place, swimming with turtles in our backyard, eating at some local beach joints, etc. just two days ago I was researching the same location to rebook this trip. And now it's gone.

Never been, but this is pretty damn sad.

I highly recommend James Michener's "Hawaii" if you're at all interested in the economic and cultural forces that forged modern Oahu and Maui.

Like all Michener books, it's a long read but fascinating nonetheless.

Serious question, what started these fires?

Kilauea is no longer erupting. Lava supply to the Halemaumau lava lake is paused. Kilauea is quiet. WTF is going on here.

Media is calling Maui a tender box? I've spent a lot of time on Maui and in Hawaii in general. It rained there almost daily. Humidity is always high and like I said daily showers are common. This seems really suspicious. These climate nuts will do anything to stir their narrative

Foreverconservative said:

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Serious question, what started these fires?

Kilauea is no longer erupting. Lava supply to the Halemaumau lava lake is paused. Kilauea is quiet. WTF is going on here.

Media is calling Maui a tender box? I've spent a lot of time on Maui and in Hawaii in general. It rained there almost daily. Humidity is always high and like I said daily showers are common. This seems really suspicious. These climate nuts will do anything to stir their narrative

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Kilauea isn't on Maui, and Maui's volcano Haleakala hasn't erupted for over 300 years. Even if Kilauea was erupting, it would not have caused the fires on the Big Island.

As to what started the fires, there are numerous potential causes from accidents to intentional. The real issue is not a fire getting started, it is the fact it happened at the worst possible time when they had the wind gusting up to 80mph.

As I posted previously, the extremely high winds are being caused by Cat. 4 hurricane Dora passing to the south, and a strong high pressure sitting to the north.

This is the same thing which happened in Texas in 2011 when Tropical Storm Lee came ashore to our east, and there was a high pressure to the west. The result was very strong winds resulting in a large number of fires including the Bastrop County Complex Fire.

At least 36 reported dead now.....still searching for more....

Foreverconservative said:

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Serious question, what started these fires?

Kilauea is no longer erupting. Lava supply to the Halemaumau lava lake is paused. Kilauea is quiet. WTF is going on here.

Media is calling Maui a tender box? I've spent a lot of time on Maui and in Hawaii in general. It rained there almost daily. Humidity is always high and like I said daily showers are common. This seems really suspicious. These climate nuts will do anything to stir their narrative

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Not volcanic…

Leading rumor I have seen is a power line came off in the winds, hit the ground, and the rest is history…

Was there 3 weeks ago and commented to my wife how dry things were when compared to when we've been there previously…

They had a wildfire there a few years back, but down the highway toward the airport on the way to Lahaina and Kaanapali…the trees there were still charcoaled but new growth had started…

I also noticed how much new residential construction was popping up on the other side of the highway from Lahaina…now all of that is gone…

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Leading rumor I have seen is a power line came off in the winds, hit the ground, and the rest is history…

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That makes more sense to me. Such a tragedy. It will never be rebuilt to feel the same. Those historic structures cannot be duplicated. Not with today's building codes, that is.

I have had the exact same thoughts…

Foreverconservative said:

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Serious question, what started these fires?

Kilauea is no longer erupting. Lava supply to the Halemaumau lava lake is paused. Kilauea is quiet. WTF is going on here.

Media is calling Maui a tender box? I've spent a lot of time on Maui and in Hawaii in general. It rained there almost daily. Humidity is always high and like I said daily showers are common. This seems really suspicious. These climate nuts will do anything to stir their narrative

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The west side of every Hawaiian Island I have been to seems to have extended dry periods...or at least be significantly drier than the north side. It sounds like the dryness, combined with unusually heavy winds from the storm made conditions for an out of control uncontainable fire ideal.

That all makes sense to me, and you could see it by how fast it spread and how out of control it was. I just want to know what actually STARTED it. Could something as small as a cigarette butt start a small fire that grows out of control in conditions like these or would it take something bigger? Pretty sure it wasn't a lightning strike. Wonder if they will ever find the cause.

I'm aware Maui does not have any active lava flows. I was just touching on the semi active mainly on the Big Island. However the origin and ignition point imho is very important. This is unprecedented. Lahaina has been around for over a century with no issues. This just seems very deliberate and I'm not contesting the hurricane passing 120 miles to the SW of Maui. But I suspect someone took advantage of the so called perfect storm to burn Lahaina to the ground. Liberal climate nuts are desperate because the people aren't buying their crying wolf any more. And Lahaina is a huge missionary destination and has been for over a century, and Libs hate Christianity and LDS. It's all just very suspicious

Foreverconservative said:

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I'm aware Maui does not have any active lava flows. I was just touching on the semi active mainly on the Big Island. However the origin and ignition point imho is very important. This is unprecedented. Lahaina has been around for over a century with no issues. This just seems very deliberate and I'm not contesting the hurricane passing 120 miles to the SW of Maui. But I suspect someone took advantage of the so called perfect storm to burn Lahaina to the ground. Liberal climate nuts are desperate because the people aren't buying their crying wolf any more. And Lahaina is a huge missionary destination and has been for over a century, and Libs hate Christianity. It's all just very suspicious

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I agree. With all of these fires nowadays, I always suspect godless liberal enviro-wacko terrorists in the back of my mind as a very real possibility. Their evil knows no bounds.

FireAg said:

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I have had the exact same thoughts…

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My fear is that what were once shops, galleries, bars, restaurants,, quaint little hotels will become highrise condos with just storefronts on the lower floor.

If I'm not mistaken, Lahaina was a historical preservation district so maybe they can exert some control but not sure how much power they have with such large scale destruction. What is left for them to protect?

It is a historical preservation district…

Might sound weird, but I kinda think a lot will depend on how much the banyan tree and park can be salvaged…

I do think Lahaina will be rebuilt for marina access alone…no other real good marina location in the vicinity unless you repurposed part of Kaanapali beach down the way, but I see no way that happens with Marriott, Sheraton, and the owners of the Alii being involved, along with those invested in Whaler's Village…

So I would suspect that the marina gets immediate attention and the businesses build back closest to the marina first and spread from there (and the marina is right there to the right of the banyan tree to boot)…

This is probably the saddest gut punch story of the year to me. I have never been to Maui (couldn't go with family due to work years ago), but have been to similar small charming towns in Oahu and Kauai that I loved, and my family and several friends absolutely loved this place. One buddy says it was his fav place in the world. To see it just wiped out in nightmarish apocalyptic fashion is just super sad and depressing. Hard to understand how something like this could happen all on it's own, without help from a psycho or group of psychos.

Can't get over how awful it is.

Brittmoore Car Club said:

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This is probably the saddest gut punch story of the year to me. I have never been to Maui (couldn't go with family due to work years ago), but have been to similar small charming towns in Oahu and Kauai that I loved, and my family and several friends absolutely loved this place. One buddy says it was his fav place in the world. To see it just wiped out in nightmarish apocalyptic fashion is just super sad and depressing. Hard to understand how something like this could happen all on it's own, without help from a psycho or group of psychos.

Can't get over how awful it is.

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We have been to Maui many, many times as a family…Lahaina was our night life and the Kaanapali Alii has always been our condo of choice…

We were literally there 3 weeks ago…

We are all absolutely heartbroken…

I've got a real affinity for trees, especially unique, large and old ones and i have told my wife many times how awesome that banyan tree was. I really hope I get to take her there to see it. It was so cool being on a ship anchored right off shore from that marina and catching a launch ashore every day to hang out.

Sea Speed said:

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I've got a real affinity for trees, especially unique, large and old ones and i have told my wife many times how awesome that banyan tree was. I really hope I get to take her there to see it. It was so cool being on a ship anchored right off shore from that marina and catching a launch ashore every day to hang out.

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I am hoping it somehow lives...it is definitely scorched and seems some of it will certainly be lost, but if any tree is built to survive a fire, it's a Banyan tree. Many trunks and widespread root systems and they store a ton of water. As silly as it sounds, that tree surviving might be symbolic in some way and give a lot of people hope after what they just went through.

Yep I assume it will be very resilient. I hope they get an arborist in there pretty quickly to check it out and come up with a course of action to save it.

On a side note, burning entire islands is how mariners used to 'hunt' in the old days. Many island was burned to the ground so that sailors waiting on the other side could kill the animals escaping the fire in order to have food. I cant imagine how many incredible species were wiped out doing this.

Wife shared with me that she's seeing calls from locals to the elites on Maui to help them rebuild and pay for it. Sounds like lots of historical anger is being expressed via this tragedy.

Our friends house is still ok and out of danger.

Sea Speed said:

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I hope that massive banyan tree in downtown Lahaina didn't get burned up.

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I'm pretty sure it did or badly damaged. Buildings around it burned up.

ETA: pic above shows it burned up.

Foreverconservative said:

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Serious question, what started these fires?

Kilauea is no longer erupting. Lava supply to the Halemaumau lava lake is paused. Kilauea is quiet. WTF is going on here.

Media is calling Maui a tender box? I've spent a lot of time on Maui and in Hawaii in general. It rained there almost daily. Humidity is always high and like I said daily showers are common. This seems really suspicious. These climate nuts will do anything to stir their narrative

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It rains in some parts, not all.

When we were in Lahaina last December my wife and I saw no rain in 6-days on that side of the island. We did get rained on when we went hiking on the north side of the Island and on the road to Hana (north east and east side).

Same when w went to Kauai in 2018, rained some parts, not others. I thought I read somewhere that Kauai has one of the wettest and driest places on earth.

YouBet said:

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Wife shared with me that she's seeing calls from locals to the elites on Maui to help them rebuild and pay for it. Sounds like lots of historical anger is being expressed via this tragedy.

Our friends house is still ok and out of danger.

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oh good grief, do these people not have any insurance? I mean that's what it's for!

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Same when w went to Kauai in 2018, rained some parts, not others. I thought I read somewhere that Kauai has one of the wettest and driest places on earth.

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Wettest for sure, summit of Mount Waialeale.

FireAg said:

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We have been to Maui many, many times as a family…Lahaina was our night life and the Kaanapali Alii has always been our condo of choice…

We were literally there 3 weeks ago…

We are all absolutely heartbroken…

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Vacationed in west Maui in 2010 and 2014. Stayed at the Ali'i in 2010 and loved it. The Kaanapali beach right in front of the Ali'i is the best in Maui - imo.

Would have stayed there again in 2014, but we were looking for a 3 BR condo and the Ali'i has max 2 BR units.

Very sad to see the damage in Lahaina.

aglaes said:

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FireAg said:

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We have been to Maui many, many times as a family…Lahaina was our night life and the Kaanapali Alii has always been our condo of choice…

We were literally there 3 weeks ago…

We are all absolutely heartbroken…

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Vacationed in west Maui in 2010 and 2014. Stayed at the Ali'i in 2010 and loved it. The Kaanapali beach right in front of the Ali'i is the best in Maui - imo.

Would have stayed there again in 2014, but we were looking for a 3 BR condo and the Ali'i has max 2 BR units.

Very sad to see the damage in Lahaina.

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Alii bases their availability on unit occupancy…yes the largest is a 2 bedroom, but those larger units have a spare, bonus room, that usually has a queen-sized Murphy bed…food for thought next time…

Not to be a leftist and place blame for every occurrence on the planet

but we all know the lefties will be proclaiming this is 'global climate change'

what responsibility did the local officials have here?