PDC Updates | Jun 24, 2009
Maalaea Fire
This 2006 wildfire on Maui, seen here in its second day, already dwarfs the village of Maalaea and its harbor. Burning for several more days, the fire eventually blackened almost all the easterly slopes of the West Maui Mountains.

Tourists trying to get to the Kahului Airport from the resort areas in West Maui—including Lahaina, Kaanapali, Kapalua—and emergency vehicles attempting to travel to and from Maui Memorial Hospital and the Westside are not able to do so when there is a fire on the Pali section of the Honoapiilani Highway between Maalaea and Olowalu. According to the Maui News, several commercial airline flight crews were airlifted to the airport by helicopter to make their departures during a relatively brief Pali fire that disrupted highway traffic for “only” about six hours. It was Father’s Day, so tourists aiming to make flights or start resort vacations were joined by residents intent on a holiday at the beaches on one side or the other of the fire. The inconveniences of such fires are unforgettable, but they are not by any means the worst effects of such fires.

“The dry and deserted area above Maalaea burns every year,” said the Maui News article. “The Maui Electric lines that serve West Maui pass through the area, some hundreds of feet above sea level, and are sometimes threatened by brush fires.” Telephone service is sometimes lost for extended periods, too, and normal business is disrupted. The news report said the Father’s Day 2009 fire “destroyed at least two homes” and that three others were threatened at press time. In addition to the sometimes very complex inconveniences, actual losses can be massive.

According to a March 2009 report from the National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA), in fact, the total cost of fire in the U.S. came to a staggering $317 billion in 2006. The Agency defines “total cost of fire” as “a combination of the losses caused by fire and the money spent to prevent worse losses, by preventing them, containing them, detecting them quickly, and suppressing them effectively.”

With fires, including house fires, wildfires and others, costing America “roughly 2.8% of U.S. gross domestic product” according to NFPA estimates, the time is now to explore what you can do to prevent fires, protect yourself and your family from them, and even to recover if you are victimized by fire. The links below will give you a number of good starting points for developing the knowledge you need, which you will also want to share with your family and friends.

Resources on the PDC website, often referencing Hawaii:

A few web articles about PDC’s support for Hawaii firefighters:

Web Resources offered by the U.S. Government, often referencing house fires:

  • FEMA recommendations concerning wildfire—before, during and after
  • U.S. Fire Administration’s website “For Citizens”
  • Links to fire prevention and safety materials
  • Firewise: A library of facts, calendar of events and wealth of links for your family and your community 
Some links may become inactive over time. If you find a broken or inoperative link to an external resource, you may want to search at that resource for the relevant information. If you find that a link referring to a pdc.org page fails, please inform the PDC Webmaster.