The man in charge of Maui’s Emergency Management Agency said Wednesday that he doesn’t regret not activating warning sirens as the deadly wildfire swept across the island.
Chief Herman Andaya said he chose to send alerts via mobile devices, radio waves, television and the opt-in alert system for residents of the province, but not via siren.
Despite claims that the warning sirens could have saved hundreds of people who instead burned in the deadly fire, Andaya argued that the sirens are generally used for tsunami warnings and Hawaiians are trained to seek higher ground when they go off, which in this case it would have led them to the blazing inferno.
There is a growing fear that many children are among the dead – because they were left home alone when schools delayed opening due to power outages before the storm.
Andaya defended his experience and qualification for the office at a midweek press conference held by Governor Josh Green.
“If we had run the siren that night, we are afraid people would have gotten mauka (towards the mountains) and if that was the case, they would have gone into the fire,” he said.
Search operations continue in Lahaina as hopes fade that survivors will be found — though some 1,300 people are still missing
“I should also note that there are no sirens mauka, or on the mountainside, where the fire spread down. So even if we had sounded the siren, we couldn’t have saved those people there on the mountainside.’
The response came after a reporter said several survivors of the blaze — which killed at least 110 people — said their neighbors and loved ones may have been saved if the sirens had gone off before they noticed the 1,000-degree flames. their houses.
The reporter also appeared to question Andaya’s resume and how he had no previous experience in emergency management before taking up his current position in 2017. He was chief of staff to a former mayor.
The member of the press then asked if he would consider handing over further responsibility to someone else.
Andaya said the claim that he had no experience before taking up his current position is “not true”.
He argued that his employment history included time in the housing department, and as a staff member in the mayor’s office, during which time he “reported to the emergency centers.”
“Saying I am not qualified I think is incorrect,” he added.
Both Governor Green and Maui Mayor Richard Bissen defended Andaya against the journalist’s quasi-accusations. Green agreed that his response to hearing the sirens would be to expect a tsunami.
Green confirmed on Wednesday that the death toll had risen to 110, even though search teams have searched only 38 percent of the affected area.
Officials, including Green, have said the death toll is likely to continue to rise in the coming weeks.
There is growing concern that the dead include many children who have been confined to their homes as schools are closed and parents are at work.
“Our parents work one, two, three jobs to make ends meet and they can’t afford to take a day off,” Jessica Sill, a kindergarten teacher at Lahaina’s King Kamehameha III Elementary School, told the Wall Street Journal. “Without school, (children) couldn’t go anywhere that day.”
On Wednesday, Herman Andaya defended his decision not to sound emergency warning sirens as the wildfire raced toward Lahaina
Governor Josh Green said he expects the official death toll to rise by about 10 people a day over the next week – officials have not said what they think the final figure will be
People walk past devastated by wildfires in Lahaina – search teams estimated to have covered 38 percent of affected area
Maui Mayor Richard Bissen defended Andaya at Wednesday’s press conference along with Governor Green
Andaya also claimed that even if the sirens had sounded, there would have been significant areas of land where there were no sirens and therefore hypothetically people would not have been saved by them.
Cadaver dogs flown in from California and Washington are assisting in the search, and relatives of the 1,300 still missing people have been asked to provide DNA samples.
Authorities have set up a task force to expedite the process of identifying bodies and notifying families of the deaths of their loved ones, as teams continue to search the rubble.
Maui County Police Chief John Pelletier said, “This is unprecedented. No one has ever seen this living today. Not this size, not this number, not this volume, and we’re not done yet.’
The cause of the devastating wildfires, the deadliest in modern US history, is still under investigation.
President Joe Biden, who spent time at his beach house in Delaware, is expected to visit the island on Monday.
Cadaver dogs flown in from California and Washington are aiding the search, and relatives of the 1,300 still missing have been asked to provide DNA samples
President Joe Biden, who spent time at his beach house in Delaware, is expected to visit the island on Monday
Poignant images also show how little is left standing in the historic city of Maui, home to more than 12,000 people until a week ago.
Exclusive photos from DailyMail.com show how rescue efforts are still underway, even as hopes of being found alive in the devastated city of Lahaina are fading.
The photos show cadaver dogs sniffing the wreckage of a burnt-out parking lot, search and rescue crews combing through the remains of a demolished warehouse, and firefighters combing the wreckage of a gas station.
The poignant images also show how little is left standing in the historic city of Maui, which was home to more than 12,000 people until a week ago.
The tourist hotspot of Front Street, with charming wooden buildings and a century-old banyan tree, is now littered with burnt-out cars, while the city’s main business artery, the Honoapiilani Highway, is a wasteland of demolished businesses and car wrecks.