Hawaii Probe Finds No Single Factor Led to Maui Wildfire Losses

No single factor led a fire in the seaside Hawaiian town of Lahaina last year to rage out of control and kill 102 people, according to a state report that assesses the government’s response to the disaster but not its root cause.

The report released Friday by the state’s attorney general blamed the devastation on a confluence of issues, including decades-old utility infrastructure, the weather, lack of preparedness, and poor communications among emergency responders.

“This investigation serves as a wake-up call for the state and county governments to learn from the past and urgently prepare for the future,” Attorney General Anne Lopez said in a statement.

The report won’t be the final word on the disaster, the country’s deadliest wildfire in more than a century. The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has conducted an investigation into the fire’s origin but has not yet made its findings public.

The results of the state investigation, prepared by the Fire Safety Research Institute, come after parties including the state of Hawaii, Maui County and Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc. reached a tentative $4 billion settlement to resolve hundreds of lawsuits over the wildfires. The August 2023 blaze damaged or destroyed about 2,200 structures, mostly homes, and caused damages estimated at $5.5 billion.

Hawaiian Electric has said that its wind-damaged power lines sparked a brush fire near Lahaina the morning of the disaster, but said fire fighters extinguished that blaze and left the scene. A fire flared up in the afternoon in the same location and, fanned by fierce winds, burned the town, according to the company.

Top photo: Search and recovery team members check charred buildings and cars in the aftermath of the Maui Fires in Lahaina, West Maui, Hawaii, on Aug. 17, 2023. Photographer: Yuki Iwamura/AFP/Getty Images.