Coloradans remember time spent living in Lahaina before fires destroyed the city
Dirk Younkerman is thinking nonstop about Hawaii right now. Working for years out of Lahaina, the thought of the town in an ashen shambles hurts.
"Place I used to live all the time, I still haven't reached," he shared.
At least three of the places he's lived in, in the past he believes are gone. Dirk has worked on boats for years, more recently as a naturalist doing a lot of traveling between Hawaii and Alaska where he helps educate people about whales.
"For me, spending so much time on Maui it's like a second home," he said.
He's been texting and calling friends. Most simply cannot be reached right now. Robert Alexander is one he was able to reach.
Alexander like Younkerman has been back and forth to Maui for years.
For many of those years, he has served as a firefighter on Maui. Thursday Alexander was on his way to help shuttle whatever was needed back and forth to the other side of the island.
"We're trying to take supplies over there to help with people and just try to get some information," he said.
Many roads are still closed. He slept in a pickup the night the fire rolled over the place he was renting.
"That whole area was completely gone. Just nothing but rubble," said Alexander. Knowing fire, he talked about how intense it was and how difficult the evacuation became. "Traffic and cars were blocking exits and you have 80 mile an hour gusts screaming down the mountain with huge amounts of heat and smoke and there's literally no time to get out."
Some jumped over the breakwall in Lahaina and into the ocean to flee the flames.
"With the winds and the ocean the way that it was, it's just a recipe for disaster with all of it. It was the worst conditions you could possibly imagine," said Alexander.
He fears that as bad as it is, worse news may be yet to come.
"The numbers of casualties are going be a lot higher than what is currently reported, once they figure out who's missing and who's accounted for," he said.
Already Younkerman is thinking about how he might be able to help. Maybe heading back earlier than planned to help work on any rebuilding needed. In addition members of the Piilani Hasaiian Civic Club of Colorado is already thinking about helping as well.
The organization regularly helps raise money for educational help for native Hawaiian students. They have a charity golf tournament scheduled for the Broken Tee Golf Course in Englewood Aug. 25.
Miriam Pumehana Paisner, a member of the club said she was already thinking about the need for help in Maui.
Alexander, who is from Oregon, said he believed the people of Maui would get through the challenges ahead.
"This community is so tight knit that they will band together and I go think that there will be heroic efforts to come together and help each other out."
