Victims, heroism remembered on anniversary of Maui fires
CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL /CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM
Members of Male I Ka ‘Ulu drape a 600-foot-lei upon the Lahaina memorial crosses today on the one-year anniversary of the Maui wildfires. Pictured is Leimana Purdy reciting an oli, or chant, during the draping.
CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARADVERTISER.COM
People paddle out at Hanaka’o’o, or Canoe Beach, in Lahaina on the first anniversary of the Aug. 8 Maui wildfires.
LAHAINA >> A full day of events marking the one-year anniversary of deadly wildfires on Maui began this morning with officials remembering the 102 people who died while recalling the harrowing stories of survivors and vowing to rebuild Maui in the long days ahead.
Maui Mayor Richard Bissen joined Gov. Josh Green, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and three of Hawaii’s four Congressional representatives at Lahaina’s West Maui Office of Recovery where Bissen said “with aloha and love” it’s important that “we take care of each other.”
Green commended “the strength of our community” and said, “The world watched the heroism of the firefighters and the heroism of the people saving each other.”
Green joined the others in pledging to keep working with the community “until we’ve done everything as much as possible for a full recovery.”
U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz said the first instincts of so many swept up in the fire storms was “to put others above themselves” by running into burning buildings to rescue older residents and carrying neighbors’ children on their shoulders to get them to safety.
“We will get through this by sticking together,” Schatz said. “… We’ve come a long way but we still have a longer way to go.”
Although a year has passed, U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono said, “the world continues to watch as we are persevering. … It’s going to be a process that listens to the voices and listens to the values. … It is all of us standing together.”
President Joe Biden wrote a letter re-enforcing federal support to help Maui recover, Hirono said.
U.S. Rep. Jill Tokuda, whose Congressional district includes Maui, said it’s been “a year that no one could ever imagine, a year that no one would wish on their worst enemy.”
Yet, Tokuda feels “a sense of gratitude” by being “surrounded by the very best of us” including people who “even when they couldn’t give, they gave more.”
“We are not leaving you,” Tokuda said. “… We will be with you every step of the way. That is our commitment to you.”
She called the residents of West Maui “the strongest people you will ever meet, (but) even the strongest should never walk alone and they will never walk alone.
“Today is a very heavy day,” Tokuda said.
At the same, she said, “102 angels are looking down on us.”
