Two weeks ago, despite being scared to death, Handi-Van driver Georgette Mahealani Chun acted swiftly to help her two passengers escape her van minutes before flames suddenly engulfed it on the side of a Kalihi road.
On Monday transit officials and city leaders gathered near the Kalihi Transit Center, just blocks from where Chun helped avoid tragedy, to laud her for her heroism and humility. They declared it Georgette Mahealani Chun Day.
"Thank you for saving my life," Ofelio Marcello Lopez told Chun on Monday. Lopez and his wife, Mayra, who uses a wheelchair, were heading to Sandy Beach on May 25 when Chun smelled something strange, exited the H-1 at King Street and pulled the Handi-Van over on Middle Street.
Smoke wafted from the vents below the windshield, and minutes later the van was consumed by fire.
Officials with Oahu Transit Services say they’re confident that a problem in the van’s fuel system sparked the blaze. They’ve inspected the other vans in the city’s aging fleet, ensuring their fuel systems’ hoses are intact and not worn, in order to try to prevent a similar fire in other vehicles, OTS President Roger Morton said Monday.
They’ll continue to keep an eye on those systems through the life of the vans, he added.
It’s the third time a Handi-Van has caught fire while on the road in the past three years, but it’s the first of those blazes in which passengers were aboard. The previous two fires, in 2011, were found to be caused by electrical problems.
Meanwhile, Handi-Van users continue to express frustration at the city’s slow pace to replace many of the aging fleet’s vans, many of them having outlived their service life. Officials with the company providing those vans, Soderholm Sales & Leasing Inc., say OTS inspectors have unnecessarily slowed approvals for 20 new vans by requesting small changes — often items not in the original specifications.
However, city officials counter that larger quality-control and safety issues have tied up the new vans’ approvals.
"Yes, I’d like it to go faster," Mayor Kirk Caldwell said Monday of the van certification process. "But we’re not going to put a van out until it’s absolutely safe to be driven for people to ride in."
He further praised Chun’s humility after being recognized for unstrapping Mayra Lopez’s wheelchair, then getting the couple to safety before the fire reached the van’s cab.
"You had someone who’s humble, modest, goes to work every day, works hard picking up people … and then going way, way, way beyond the call and putting her life on the line and saying, ‘No big deal,’" Caldwell said.
As buses rumbled in and out of the transit center, Chun said, "I’m sure all of my co-workers would have done the same in that situation, and we work as a team. I’d like to thank my passengers so much for being calm."
