Maui’s deadly wildfires reveal a vulnerability in the United States that is growing as quickly as threats from climate change: Large swaths of the country are in dry, dangerous areas where wildfires ignite, and governments cash-strapped have ineffective contingency plans to save lives.
That’s the deadly combination of the Maui disaster: wildfire risk coupled with what some experts and victims called questionable emergency preparedness. And it has happened in some of the deadliest fires in the country and around the world, alarming fire experts and community leaders.
Similar scenarios occurred in Paradise, California, where 85 people died and nearly 19,000 structures were destroyed. the campfire in 2018; and in Algeria, Italy and Greece, where questions of effective emergency response and preparedness were raised after more than 40 people died in total wildfires sparked by an intense heat wave, strong winds and dry vegetation last month. Canada is experiencing a record and devastating wildfire season, with more than 33.9 million acres burned and at least four people killed so far.
In Maui, where at least 111 people died and more than 2,200 acres were burned in the Aug. 8 wildfires, the county already knew it was at high risk of wildfires, according to a study it was commissioned two years ago following an “unprecedented wildfire season” in 2019, during which more than 20,000 acres were burned.
“The fire problem in Hawaii and Maui is more extreme than in the continental United States,” the study said, noting dozens of buildings and vehicles were damaged in a wildfire in 2018. Although there were no deaths in those two years, warnings were issued – and perhaps not heeded by local authorities .
Now, experts around the world are re-examining many places that may also be at risk after the Maui crisis, which is now among the ten deadliest wildfires ever recorded in the United States since 1871.
“The next Maui could be anywhere,” said Tirtha Banerjee, professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California, Irvine. “Realistically, almost any place could experience a wildfire.”
America is not the only country worried about wildfires
Thousands of communities, from urban enclaves, coastal towns and isolated regions in the United States and abroad, such as Maui, are vulnerable to wildfires due to the increasingly deadly combination of change climate and the lack of emergency plans and resources from governments, experts say.
“There seems to be a consensus within the scientific community that the situation might get a little worse before it gets better,” Banerjee said.
Alexis NormandCEO of Green, a platform helping companies track their carbon consumption, said a wildfire can happen in the “most unthinkable places on earth” under the right conditions. Over the past month, large fires have affected the Greek islands, the Canary Islands and The Indonesian islands of Sumatra led to intense burning resulting from heat waves in southern Europe and North Africa, Normand pointed out.
Normand also referenced the thousands of residents currently evacuating Canada’s northwest territories, leading to emergency declarations because of forest fires. Nearly 400 active fires are still burning in British Columbia.
“There is also a growing water shortage in countries like France, Australia and Egypt,” Normand said by telephone from Paris. “I don’t want to sound too pessimistic, but the answer is definitely yes. Wildfires are happening more frequently and in rarer places.”
Global warming is causing an increase in wildfires at the same time when communities may not be committing to investing and executing preparedness plans to reduce wildfire risks, said Laurie Wayburn, co-founder and president of Pacific Forest Trusta non-profit organization based in San Francisco.
“As bad as the situation is here in America, it could be just as bad in Europe, because they are learning the same lessons we are,” Wayburn said. “It seems like you have to be in the middle of a crisis to learn that you need to avoid tragedies in the first place.”
THE NATION’S DEADLIEST WILDFIRES:As the death toll from Maui’s fires rises, here’s how it compares to the deadliest wildfires in the U.S.
US wildfires ‘burning harder, faster and more intensely’
Record temperatures, extreme drought conditions and significantly high winds during major weather events, including storms accompanied by thunder and lightning, are among the causes of recent spikes in wildfires in high-risk areas in the United States, Canada and Europe, said Michele Steinbergdirector of the wildland fire division at the National Fire Protection Association.
In the United States, almost half of the land area is forests, shrubs and grasslands, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Currently, nearly 45 million U.S. homes are located near or near these areas, the EPA said.
Over the past five years, wildfires have destroyed nearly 63,000 structures. The majority of them are houses, said Steinberg, who also serves on President Joe Biden’s staff. Wildfire Mitigation and Management Commission.
“We’re definitely seeing a huge increase. It’s significantly higher than in the last ten years,” Steinberg said. That’s mainly because Americans have settled in formerly rural areas, particularly in southern and western states over the past half-century, she said.
“We’re moving toward these fire-prone areas,” Steinberg said. “We now have many more wildfires that will burn harder, faster and with more intensity due to these conditions.”
“The deadliest and most devastating forest fires ahead of us”
André BozzoFire captain of the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District in the San Francisco Bay Area said “Americans are on the front lines of wildfires like never before.”
“The deadliest and most devastating wildfires are happening right in front of us,” said Bozzo, a firefighter for 25 years. “In the fire industry we half-heartedly joke that all these tactics we’ve learned…throw them out the window.”
Bozzo said Americans, and those in other countries, have simply failed to heed warnings about a changing environment due to climate change. A former scientist, Bozzo said heat-trapping carbon dioxide hits every corner of the Earth at record levels.
There are also various factors that contribute to wildfires globally, Bozzo said. Among them are the spread of invasive plants, trees and grasses. And while accumulated rain and snow can reduce drought conditions and the risk of fires, Bozzo said, they also increase vegetation growth, which can fuel fires during the dry summer months if left untreated. is not cut or removed.
Many municipalities may not be doing certain strategies, including thinning oversized forests by cutting down trees and shrubs and conducting prescribed burns to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires, Bozzo said.
“This is by no means limited to the United States. There have always been wildfires in Greece and France, but have they reached the scale that we are seeing? No,” said Bozzo, who is also co-founder of Tablet order, an incident response software platform used by the fire departments of San Francisco, Charlotte, North Carolina, Columbus, Ohio, and Los Angeles County. “These wildfires…no, megafires…are not one-offs. Coordinated plans to prevent them must be an ongoing, committed effort.”
Lessons learned from the Maui fire: “We will pay 10 times more”
In Maui County’s 2021 report on forest fire preventionauthorities were encouraged to adopt an “aggressive plan to replace dangerous fuel sources” that start wildfires.
Wildfire experts in Hawaii, including Camilo Mora, a climate scientist and professor at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, said he has been warning state officials for years that wildfire preparedness is essential. Mora said he was among those who cited that invasive grasses and other fast-burning vegetation used as fuel were endangering some areas, including Maui.
Vegetation grows quickly in rain, but also dries out in drought, Mora explained. Left unattended, vegetation is ripe to burn quickly in a fire. And that’s what he says happened in the Maui wildfire because not enough was being done.
He cited the Hawaii Division of Forestry and Wildlife, which handles fire suppression and prevention, and has about $28 million. operational budget for this financial year. Probably not enough funds to do what is necessary, Mora said.
“We didn’t pay enough attention,” Mora said. “It wasn’t an unexpected tragedy, we knew that. It was just a matter of timing.”
‘WE DON’T WAIT’:Maui community shows distrust of government following deadly wildfires
The 2021 report also states that island communities are “particularly vulnerable because populations tend to be clustered and dependent” on single highways. “Evacuation routes, locations, and evacuation resources for fire-affected populations are also hampered by fire incursions,” the report said.
Lahaina residents reportedly had difficulty leaving the popular residential and tourist town because traffic was completely stopped on Honoapiilani Highway, the main road, as the wildfire spread.
As rebounding cities like Paradise, California, work on their wildfire mitigation plansMora said he was thinking and calculating the emotional, physical and potentially financial impact the wildfire would have on Maui in the future.
He is confident that Hawaii officials, local and state, will turn the tragedy into concrete wildfire prevention measures. He and thousands of others will be devastated if they don’t.
“More manpower is needed for restoration and reconstruction,” Mora argued. “Because of the damage caused by this fire, we’re probably going to pay 10 times what it would have cost to fix this problem in the first place.”
