Folau Tone steadied himself as a gale whipped through his street in Lahaina. Trying to nail down the rattling tin roof on his family’s home, he gave up as fragments were stripped away.

In West Maui, power lines were crashing down, and the electricity was out across a large swath of the island. Outdoor furniture and debris were flung across yards.

Folau’s wife had already left for her job at a hotel, but their four children had stayed behind. It was Aug. 8, what would have been the first day of school. Classes were canceled because of the power outage.

The gusts did not deter his mother, Faaoso, who stood outside fussing over a pot of cassava root while another pot burbled with fish stew. She liked cooking in the open air and had long ago set up a makeshift kitchen with propane burners under a tent.

At 70, Faaoso enjoyed overseeing a home that bustled, happy to live with children and grandchildren over the years. Her husband, Maluifonua, 73, was retired, having suffered a back injury when a linen cart slipped while he was working at a resort.

Folau and his family moved in seven years ago, joining his sister Salote, 39, and her son, Tony Takafua. The siblings helped pay the mortgage.

At about 2 p.m., Folau showered and was preparing to leave for his job as a bartender when he received word that the restaurant was not going to open. He figured that he and his kids would hole up for the day.

But smoke began to swirl outside their home, a white bungalow with blue trim. Neighbors came outside to peer up at the mountains, their shouts drowned out by the wind. Some headed for their cars.

Folau, 44, had evacuated under threat of fire before, and he told his children to pack a change of clothes. The smoke soon thickened and darkened the sky. Folau found his footsteps quickening, his voice growing urgent.

His daughter Liliana, 14, jumped into the front seat of their silver truck, a Nissan Titan. Siosiua, 9, and Auralia, 5, crawled in the back seat. So did their 2-year-old brother, Keuli, and Nala, their Labrador mix.

Salote and Tony, 7, hopped into the white Honda Civic that she had recently purchased. Her parents climbed in the back. The plan was to follow Folau and meet at his wife’s hotel.

Before leaving, Folau grabbed the two pots of food his mother had made and rushed to place them in the trunk of Salote’s car. It would be nice to show up with a meal if there was no working electricity.

A frantic escape

Inside his truck, Folau did not see the fire, but he could feel the encroaching heat as he gripped the steering wheel. He started down Kuhua Street. Salote followed. The neighborhood was shrouded in gray, and wind was hurling embers, leaves and dirt in the air.

A fallen mango tree blocked access to the main thoroughfare that could get them out of the area. Vehicles were changing direction, jamming the road. Folau turned onto Aki Street, but drivers motioned that there was no outlet there, either. He turned back to Kuhua Street. Cars were trying to maneuver around one another but getting nowhere. He was trapped.

“Dad, get us out of here!” Liliana, his daughter, begged.

Alongside the street ran a metal fence. Another truck began ramming into it, futilely trying to break it down. Finally, the driver got out and started running, leaving his vehicle behind.

Folau scanned for another means of escape. “At the time, I wasn’t thinking of anything — just feeling that the kids were there and just trying to get them somewhere safe,” he said.

He found himself back by the fallen mango tree. Maybe, Folau thought, he could wedge his truck against the side of the fence, force his wheels over the branches and break through to the other side.

Nearby homes began to ignite. The inside of Folau’s truck grew hotter. He could barely see through the windshield. His children clung to one another and screamed.

“I just heard my kids crying. And then I just went for it.”

He gunned the engine. His sister Salote, he hoped, was close behind.

A valley of cinders

As flames tore through the heart of Lahaina, those elsewhere on Maui had little immediate information.

Folau’s wife, Sabrina, was working the front desk at the Westin Kaanapali Ocean Resort Villas about 4 miles away, and trying to calm guests complaining about the power outage. Smoke was twisting through the sky outside.

Sabrina, 44, began receiving texts from her eldest, Liliana. But cell service was shoddy, and each message was one word.

“mom”

“please”

“answer”

Sabrina took a break to drive to Folau’s restaurant and was relieved he had not shown up. It meant he was very likely with their children.

Finally, around 5 p.m., her husband appeared in the lobby, his face ashen. Guests were around, so he quietly told her to walk outside.

There she saw that the front and sides of his truck were scraped and battered. An electrical wire was tangled underneath. Liliana grabbed her and cried. Her other children and the dog were safe inside the truck.

An administrator at the hotel would later recall the scene as one of the first clues that something was terribly wrong in Lahaina.

Folau was anxious to retrace his steps to search for his sister’s car, but the roads were impassable. Calls and texts went unanswered. Across the island, thousands had been displaced and separated. Sabrina’s manager offered the family a hotel room for the night.

By morning, Folau had still not heard from his parents or Salote. The next day, he found a way to get into the burn area with his brother-­in-law and a friend.

They saw a valley of cinders and burned dreams. Most of the homes were ash and rubble, some marked only by concrete steps to nowhere. Folau’s own home had disappeared into dust, nothing left to be saved.

Cars with melted tires dotted the street, their metal frames nearly unrecognizable.

But one had a bent hood as if it had slammed into something. It also held a devastating detail: two scorched metal pots.

‘Where is Tony?’

It has been more than a month since the fire, and dozens of victims have yet to be identified. The authorities count the total lives lost at 115, but many residents are convinced there are more. And there are still dozens of names on a list of the missing.

Forensic experts and search teams combed through the rubble for weeks looking for any semblance of human remains. Families who have provided their DNA still wait for closure.

Folau knew before the officials: Faaoso, Maluifonua, Salote and Tony had died in their car. Three generations taken by flames they could not outrun. Tony would have celebrated his 8th birthday next month, the youngest victim to be identified so far.

Survivors have deep trauma and complicated mental scars. There are those who cannot speak of what they saw. And plans to restart their lives are outlined in grief.

Folau and his family are staying at a hotel as they figure out what comes next. Wherever they land, the household will feel incomplete.

Siosiua, his 9-year-old, has not yet come up with a good answer when other kids innocently ask, “Where is Tony?”

Folau is grateful to be there for his son in these moments after spending so much of his life working. It has been good to focus on fatherhood.

Like many, he is struggling with the weight of unwarranted guilt. Why his car made it out but his sister’s did not. Whether he could have swung around and made sure they pulled through.

His siblings and friends assure him that he is not to blame. His own children speak of his heroism. The way they see it, Folau was their protector, a father fueled by love and desperation racing them out of a terrifying blaze.

And his wife knows the unbearable alternative: “If he had gone back, we would have lost them all.”

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