LAHAINA, Hawaii – A devastating firestorm has reduced many homes to ashes in Lahaina, a popular island tourist destination in Hawaii.
On Tuesday, brushfires fueled by high winds quickly spread and engulfed Lahaina on Maui’s western side.
The wall of flames is to blame for the death of at least 80 individuals, with a significant number of those remains discovered in Lahaina, government officials said at last check. It makes it one of the deadliest disasters in the U.S. state’s history.
Lahaina residents have slowly been allowed to return but forced to wait hours in their vehicles parked on the main road into town before entering the fire zone due to a nightfall curfew.
DEATH TOLL CLIMBS TO 80 FROM HAWAII FIRES AS HEART-WRENCHING SCENES REVEAL MAUI’S DEVASTATION
Those who have come back, or even lucky to be alive, return to charred buildings and scorched cars in the wildfires’ wake, drone footage captured Thursday by Javier Cantellops shows.
One estimate from the property data aggregator CoreLogic puts the estimate of destroyed homes at more than 3,000.
Cantellops said he was flying his drone to help assess the damage to the town.
It’s still unclear how the fires started, but when they did ignite, the island was ripe for an inferno. Extremely dry conditions combined with 70 to 80 mph winds fueled the flames and created a challenging battle for the island’s firefighters.
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