Lahaina Maui Fires Ta aroa Nui My Brother Warners Lahaina Fire Story Interview

Video Transcript:

So Warner just spelled your first and last name so we can get that correct. W-A-R-N-E-R, my first name. Du du lao cahaya lii is my last name. It's D-U-L-D-U-L-A-O-I-F-N-K-A-H-A-L-I. Life-long Maui resident. Born and raised Maui. We born in Kihei, grew up in Kihei. Married Lahaina. Married to the cahaya lii, ohana. How long have you been a member of the union? I've been a member of the union. Probably since 2003. Somewhere around that. It's all about 20 years. Maybe. How? Take us back to last Wednesday. What was going on? When did you first get a sense of something being off? So last Wednesday, I went to work over here in Kihei. I'm a wife who's supposed to bring my son to work because he has to go to work at 5 or 5. I had my... It's a teleclock. She tells me, I'm not driving. It's too windy. I'm scared. I said, that's okay. I'm going to come and get him. So I need work. I don't know before lunch. I get too late, I know. And I get a message from my boss. So don't come back. Stay there. Take care of your family. So I'm okay. I'm going to get home. Everybody's worrying. There's the fires pretty mild at the moment. But there's still a lot of smoke. As we're in the house, whenever trying to pack things, we're watching the smoke monitoring it. And it starts to get black. And it starts to get more dense. Everybody in the neighborhood is coming out to the street. I'm dropping on the roofs. Trying to get a glimpse on this thing. I tell my wife, I gotta go and come right back. She's like, where are you going? I'm gonna go take a ride. I want to put eyes on this thing. So we know exactly how long we have. So I take my bike. I ride down a lot of my neighborhood. And I keep spits up in the high nut. The exit to the highway is shut down. There's poles, there's wires already down. You cannot go out to blackies. I take my dirt bike. I call it a cross. Pull it back over the ace, jump out of the curves. Pull it towards the back of the ace. I like coming home with food and farms. As I'm going up, past minutes stop. My brain thinks of my cousin up in the housing. The apartment is up there in the low-income housing. I'm like, I better go check on him. He works 99 security. So as I'm going up the road, I get to the top of the road and I see his truck in the parking lot. And I think to myself, I gotta go to my home, cousin. So I go to his door. I pound him on his door. I'm yelling his name. For like 10 minutes. People are getting in the car as they're leaving. I can't even call this truck. Like I hope he's at home. He opens the door. When his eyes barely open. And he goes like this, open the door. Oh, cousin, how are you doing? I'm going to go to the car. Get your stuff and get your kids. And get the hell out of here. It was going on. It was happening. I point to the side. Always saw his black smoke. He starts to panic. I'm going to come back, check on you. Get the hell out of you. So I dig out. I'm going up the bypass. As I'm going up cars are piled on the side. I'm looking to fire. I'm going to turn it out. Whatever the reasons was to be in there. As I'm going up the bypass, I pass this lady. Hold the lady. I'm not going to say how old she was. I don't know. Hold the lady. Pushing her bike up the bypass. I pass. I come up to the turn. I see two guys on their bikes. One of them, you know. And his friend. Thank you up there. I'm like, how are you guys doing? You know, where's your family? When you live, what can we do? What can I do to help you guys? One of the guys, I said, oh, it does my house. I'm like, which one? Let's go get your stuff. He says, two one with two planes. I took my friend. I'm like, where's your house? He says, four doors down. It's probably next. I know he has a lot of toys, dirt bikes, golf carts. I said, I'm going to jump in your bike. Let's go get your bikes. I said, nope, let them burn. I'm going to go get you. The lady walking by us with her bike. Auntie, how are you doing? Where are you going? How can we help you? She starts crying. My children, my grandchildren are in that neighborhood. That's burning. Just stuck by the wall. And they get out. Me and the two guys on the dirt bike. We jump in our bikes and we try to go to the wall. I don't know exactly what wall. Because I'm not living in that neighborhood. I don't know. One of my guys says he knows exactly. So we follow him. We get to the bypass with a bridge. And we can see it. I'm like, what wall? Where's the kids? The wall is right there. There's no body there. They must have got out. Stress relief, right? I think it's all good. The lady comes by crying on her phone. I can't get hold of nobody. They're still in there. Oh my god. She pushes her bike across the bypass bridge. To the training fence. I watch her climb the fence up and over. Scale down the 12 foot seam in a wall. I ride my bike straight to the fence. I jump over the fence and I'm standing on the wall. Ready to jump down. And I yell, anti, where are you going? Where are your kids? She says, they're in there. I'm going to go in there. I yell, what direction? Anti, I'm coming. She points. I jump on my bike. Down, under the bridge to the bypass. Right now there's cops blocking people from going up the handle on the road. I'm coming full speed. Cops, pray over with me down. I just put my helmet down. You're not stopping me. I go up the handle on the road. I go to the neighborhood. Thank God the neighborhood is still there today. People are standing there shooting water, under decks, in the second story. Standing on the streets, talking story. I don't know, maybe planning to leave. Cops talking to people. I pull up to everybody in panic asking where is this lady? Have you seen this lady? Not a little. Not a little man, sir. Not a little bit nervous in the lady. I'm like, how can you guys not have seen this lady? She came to here running. I go up and down the streets. Five, six times every street. Looking yelling for her, I don't even know what her name was. Smokes coming. Wins is howling. I better get out of here because the only way to get out of here is going down the handle on the road towards the fire. I'm like, okay, I'm getting out of here. I go down the handle on the road. As I'm trying to make that turn to go on the bypass, the winds. As the winds was blowing, it was coming in like swells. Like heavy gusts. And then it was heavier gusts. And then it was heavier gusts. As I try to make that turn, I'm trying to go straight. The winds pushing me at a diagonal all the way to the guardrail. I stick my feet on the guardrail so it doesn't push me on my bike down. I'm just trying to hold my bike up, keeping the throttle open so my bike doesn't die. And the winds let up. Going down a little bit. I'm lying on the handle on the road to the bypass. Pass the car. That was trying to stop me. First, he was on his, like, outside his car, trying to stop me. And I'm coming back. He's in his car, waving me down. I pull it up to his window and he's like, what are you doing in there? I'm trying to save my family. I'm trying to get them out. His face changes. It's starting to worry. It's just asking me questions if they got out. And whatever. I'm okay. And whatever. And I'm like, yeah. So if we see us riding our bikes, we're not here to look for fire. We're here to help and look for people. So don't stop us on our bikes. I leave. Going up the bypass. Going to check on my cousin who I just woke up. The lady seems to be coming. She leaves me now. I'm like, Auntie, oh my God. Thank you. I'm glad I got to find you again. I was worried about looking in there. I'm like, where's all your kids? She points to his adult. Her adult kids. I'm like, all right. Thank goodness. Where's all your babies? Where's your grandkids? She opens the van door and there's seven of them in there. She says, thank you for putting your life in danger. My family? No idea who this lady was. Got her contacts. Ask her, is there anybody else that can go fine and help? Anybody else that you know is still stuck in the fire? Her response is no mom. Everybody else is great love, Lord. I said, okay. This sounds great. I leave the boy and check on my cousin. Go back down. I know the fire is really crazy. Really crazy. Pull up the head of the fireman. Him and his son is in the truck. Getting ready to leave. They ask me, where do we go? We don't know. We just woke up. I said, right now, I know the only safe place is on the top of that bypass because you're going to be above the fire. I follow you. Fireman truck comes right on the corner. He's telling us. He's going to get out of here. The fire is right on the other side. I look in the passenger seat. I was my apprentice three years ago. He's known as my face. He said, I'll go. You better get out of here. You better stay safe. You better stay safe. Because I can go this way. You gotta go that way. You better not do the same thing tomorrow. Don't worry, Uncle. So we leave it. My cousin's following me out. Follows me to the top of the bypass. And we're watching the fire for a bit. I have time. I gotta go. I gotta go. Make sure I have my bags packed. My family needs to know about this fire. We gotta get out of here. Make sure we got stuff to do. Or get out of here. Everything we need. I leave. I go home. I tell my wife, my brother-in-law. They're turning in the back. Malano is turning in the back. And everybody in the new on the street to get out. Get ready to get out. My wife made some dinner. Laugh-laugh. So whatever. I told her to just cook dinner already. Just cook it. She made some laugh-laugh. I got home. I'm like, how many laugh-laugh is left? She says two. Put it in the top of her. Whatever rice we get, whatever. Some juice. Some snacks. I took that to my cousin who just woke up. I'm gonna hear it because I bought you some food. So you guys can have some food. And he was like, my mom and me and my son was just talking to me. And I was like, I'm starving. We just woke up. I'm like, perfect. Here you go. Enjoy. Whatever. We were sitting there still watching the fire. The wind's blowing. We're talking. I'm like, man, this wind is gonna just screw everything up. This wind is gonna be the one that kills everything. As we're watching the fire. And the neighborhood's getting more and more burned. We see other ambers fly over the river. Land into the bushes. Next to his apartment that I just woke him up from. The fireman pulls up on this side of the apartment. Doesn't see this fire. Doesn't know that there's a fire there. I see the fireman in there. I think about that boy. For a split second, I was gonna ride my bike and go down there and tell the fireman where it is. Right? I'm like, okay, I can tell them. We can save this. Probably 10, 15 seconds go by. Half that building disappear and smoke. I'm like, if I want to roll up that road through that smoke, I probably gonna pass it out. So I look at my cousin, a shukisan. And I said, I will see you on the other end of this. Get a lot of hair. I get in my family, and we're going to my house. I tell my wife, grab everything. Important, whatever we can fill in the trucks. And we getting out of here. We're going. The evacuating everybody to the Civic. Let's go to the Civic. Repacking stuff in. I'm telling everybody to get out of the house, making sure everybody knows we're leaving. Fireman come up. I'll start turning off the water. When you're right then, I started to realize I need my fishing gear. I need some fishing gear. I start grabbing fishing gear. Whatever I can. Whatever I don't have to go into and dig. Get in my truck. And then my wife, before that, she's like, okay, I see you at the Civic. I'm like, I'll be there in five minutes. She goes, and then I'm grabbing all my stuff. I leave my house. My gas tank says seven miles till empty. And my Toyota Tacoma. I know this traffic already. So we get to the Civic. We start going to the Civic. Climbing through Hawaiian homes. Going down towards the post office, we see the entrance. The exit to the highway right there is blocked off. Nobody can go out. So I'm thinking there's another exit on the corner of the police side. I drive over there. There are really many cars on the road. I drive almost all the way down. And I see there's wires and poles down there. And nobody getting out. I tell my wife, turn around. We went to the dirt parking lot. So we get up there. And we're like, getting out. We're watching the fire. Probably out in a half hour. 45 minutes maybe. And then we can see the silhouette of our neighborhood. The glow of the fire right behind it. And I thought these seals are two big pine trees. One of them is on our street. So the fire is getting closer to the tree. I turned to my wife. I thought I'm coming back. She's like, where are you going? So I'm going to go find us an exit. I walk down. Now, by now, cars are coming. 100 to 200 cars came within that time. We were watching. I start walking down. I go, figure I go, walk down towards the corner on polyside. Maybe they started clearing things. Or they can, I can help to clear things so we can get out of here. Another local guy comes and meets me. Whatever we start walking down together. Now there's cars bumper to bumper. From where I was parked on the top. All the way to the exit in corner of poly. People are outside their cars already. Cars off. They're just talking, panicking, whatever. Looking at the wires. I'm looking at the poles. I'm like, there's no way we're getting out of this tree here. Start looking at the borders. What kind of space can fit my wife's truck? Then I see this car. Come on the highway. Quoters to corner of poly. It wasn't an ambulance. It wasn't a car. Look at the whole way. That's where the car came from. I don't know. I look like that towards the pole surface. You see another car pulling out. At the whole meeting you car, we're going out that way. We run all the way up to the dirt parking. As I'm going up, I'm stopping at every car. Telling them, turn around, go out to the pole surface side. They're all telling me, and I know, because I drove through there. The pole surface side was closed. Nobody can go out. But now that I see cars leaving, I'm telling them, I've seen somebody leaving through there. That is our only way out. Some of them believe me. Some of them start to argue. I said, believe what you want. I'm going out that way. I'm going up to every car telling them to go out that way. A lot of them arguing with me. Which is understandable. We're in a state of panic. My landlord has been waiting at the dirt parking lot for me to come back. She's like, what are we doing? I thought I'd get in line. When you get through the tennis courts at the bottom of this road, turn left. She said, it's closed. I said, I don't care. Turn left. So she gets in line. I get to my wife. I cannot even breathe already. She's like, what are we doing? I said, get in line. We're going to go down. We're going to turn left. I thought it just followed me. So, but now, because I've told people to go and turn left. Nobody is waiting to go right. There's going left. So traffic is starting to flow. I can get out from where I parked. And to the road to go down, I can see the bottom of the road. I see a cop down there. In my head, I'm like, okay, perfect. I know he's going to alternate traffic. I see the truck at a weight. It seemed like it was an hour. Probably five, ten minutes. Our line did not move. Cars kept going across. I get out of my truck. I run all the way down to the cop. I told him every colorful road, colorful word in the rainbow that I knew. I told him, we want to get out too. We don't want to die here. Let us out. Turn to the car behind me. I said, you going this way? When all the way back up, did the same thing what I just did earlier. I get to my truck, all the lines start moving. I look at my gas gauge. It says, please refuel now. My wife's car has less than quarter tank of gas. She is the kind that if the tank reaches quarter tank, she doesn't want to drive nowhere. So we get out. It's not going down. We get out by the post office side. Everybody is going slow. We get to the highway and we see all the posts on the road, across the road. Everybody is going slow. On the car side of the highway, all the way by the guard rail going really slow. Then I see this cop pointing to the next lane. So I get out and everybody is still going in the corner. I get out of that lane and I didn't mean to break the speed. But I made my truck as fast as it could because I had no gas. Before I left the Civic, my wife was asking me where we are going to go. I said, we are going to go to Kahana McDonald's because that is far enough. Away from the fire, there's the only gas station that I know that might have gas. So as I'm driving my truck as fast as it can go, I know I left my wife far behind. I'm going to go check down by Honakowa ABC store, that's the gas station. I know they're not open, whatever. I'm just going to go on there and see. I take a circle on there and everything is black. Go back to the highway, fly and go as fast as I can to Kahana McDonald's. I circled around the bank, circled around the gas station and did not see my wife's truck. Starting to freak out. So I pull out, go to the street light where the highway meets, and just about to turn off my truck and stand outside so my wife can see me in my construction shirt. Still from work. I see her coming down. She's like, where are we going? Go park in there, we're going to stay in there tonight. So we go in there. We find the corner, by the way there's a general store and the handicapped stall in that corner. We park our two trucks in there. Everybody's coming now. The gas station is getting filled with cars, like filled with cars. Everybody's freaking out, everybody's wearing, you know? And we're just going to stay here tonight. Stay there that day. We woke up the next day. Still in shock, still can't believe. Still trying to look at the smoke in the air. See if it's getting less. Seeing it's getting more. Right there in the morning, two workers from that store walked on the stairs. I'm going all right. You're going to open the store, people can get food, they can get water. It's not going to be so bad. The standing front door, the workers standing front the door, and the other 30 to 40, 50 people waiting for the door to open standing there. So I reached you the corner where the store might be open and then all of a sudden I turned and I looked. And there's no workers in front of the door anymore. In my brain, the store's not going to open. It's right there, you know, whatever. I thought in the people what I know. They come to me, I was the only one that had a radio on that gas station. I had the radio playing so we could have some kind of report, some kind of music. People would come and go by my truck. Somebody came, said that our O'Hana was looking for you guys. We have a house in the Pili, come to our house, we have running water, we don't have electric. We have a barbecue, and we have a pool. Sounds great. Okay, we're coming. It's like, yeah, we're kind of saved, yeah. Start packing up a gear. I had one tent, I had one cot, and my cooler, whatever. So we packed everything, put in new trucks, my wife, to see her face, little bit relief. I think to myself, by now there's probably 200 cars in the neighborhood. By now, I have to park my truck for the mile and walk to that house, because that house street is probably filled with cars. Everything I own is in my truck. And in my wife's truck, I told her, take the kids, I'm not leaving my truck. She's like, why? I tell her why, I'm not leaving my truck out on my side. Okay, I want to take the kids, I said, yes, please, take the kids, go shower, go eat, whatever. She said, I want to come back, check on you. She's gone. People, tourists, locals, come up to me, talk story with me. I'm trying to not make the situation worse. I'm trying to crack jokes, I'm trying to be humorous, I'm trying to relieve a lot of the stress that people are freaking out on. People are looking at me like, how can you be like this in this time? Look at them, I'm telling you, right now you have two choices. Either you laugh or you cry. You have two choices right now. They look at me like, wow, just what it is. It's a local guy who comes. Everybody's flocking to me by my video, some come, some go. It's a local guy who comes around the corner. Oh, I know you, whatever, talk story, how's your family? I don't know. What you live? Oh, I know, I'm lying in the Luna. I can't get a hold of them, I worry, my phone dying. I'm playing a plug-in phone and I can't get one charge already, I'll be hanging out. This other guy comes on his panic guy. I worry, same story, I can't get a hold of his family. I need a water, I have my cooler. I'm offering people water, drinks, whatever I have to help them cope, give them water. The day goes on, people come by my radio and say, hey, I've seen people using the phone here. I've seen people using the phone there. I've seen people kind of put our food over here. So I'm getting intel, whatever. I'm spreading the intel that I know to whoever I know. If they can get out, they can get out and go get it, whatever. So I'm just trying to keep people, tell everybody what I know so that they can survive and whatever. My wife comes back and then so we just start hanging out, trying to go, let the day go by. Do whatever we've got to do. People come in to put gas, there's no electricity, there's no gas. Some sense here, some currents. People are trying to give me money, seeing me want to help you. I don't take the money, I'm like, what am I going to do with that? By the time I can use that, it's useless. No, take it, just take it. You don't know, you want to help me, you go get me water. You go get me food. Two tourists, older ladies came up to me and tried to do that, gave me money. I said, don't give me money. How can we help? Give me water. There's people, 50 people in line sitting standing in the sun for six hours. Then they're like, oh yeah, we have a case of water at the hotel. We'll call my back. I'm like, okay, take your water, go in a salt, whatever. Half hour later, I see these two older ladies carrying one case of water down the stairs. So I run over there and I give them my heart and I tell them, thank you. You don't know what that means. They say that's all they have to give. I said that is more than, more than you know. I put the case of water on my chalk. I opened the water up and then I yelled, anybody who won a bottle of water, 40 hands went up. And from here, you come here and you get your bottle of water. They all want to give me money. I don't give me money, I'm not going to take you money. People come up, same thing, you know, we trade, we barter, whatever, I'll take that. But I'm not taking no money. The whole time my wife left for my kids and I'm sitting there, trying to stop people from going crazy. Stop them from eating each other because everybody's face went from scared that night. To the next day, stressing out what we're going to eat, what we're going to eat, to that night getting angry, like within hours and within days. People start turning angry. So I'm trying to help crack jokes, whatever. There are stories, people say that there was popping gas at that gas station that I was just asked for a day and a half. They show up, I said there's no gas. I saw people popping gas this morning. I said there's nobody popping gas this morning. I was here. Okay. Four o'clock comes another swarm of people coming. There are no more gas, no more electricity. They said they were going to turn the... Five o'clock. Today we won't pop gas. I thought you sure? Because the animal pose I passed on the highway and the animal pose we cannot see in the mountains that can only be fixed with helicopter. I don't think they're going to turn the animal in five o'clock today. But if what you're saying is true, let's get out of here. I'm all for it. 30 cars, 40 cars coming with the same story. Waiting for five o'clock. We're going to pump gas, are we getting out of here? I want to believe it's so bad. Five o'clock comes. I'm like, and I yell, really loud. It's five o'clock, let's start pumping and get the hell out of here. Everybody give me like a motorcycle. Just try and distract dogs, right? Five thirty comes. Everybody's still tripping out, freaking out. I'm like, I got a... I'm like, what are you guys doing here? Five o'clock came, we got gas. What are you talking about? I'm like, don't you know nowadays after pandemic, everything is on an app. You download the app, you Bluetooth to that shit, you Bluetooth to gas to your gas tank. We all got gas already, let's get out of here. Guys, it's just laughing, tripping out. Like, how the hell are you doing this? Right? I'm like, I don't know. In my head, taking as soon as I get out of here, I'm coming right back. As soon as I get out. The dig was on about 8 o'clock, p.m. This white van pulls up, big van. The guy comes out and he opens his door. He says, I don't have a lot of stuff. But I have salads, I have vegetables in my van, whatever you guys want, you guys can have it. Everybody swarms like flies. Somebody had hot food from someplace there. But they're like, hey, you here with your family, you guys have some hot food. Forever grateful to that person. So everybody's swarming that van. I gave my wife to hot food, eating half hour later after that. A white truck and SUV from Naloo's restaurant, sorry, I didn't want to say names. But from a restaurant, pulls up and these lady yells, anybody hungry, we have hot food, come and get food. Everybody just left the van, the van is pretty much empty. They come up, start taking food. The lady yells, anybody willing to take anybody out of here? Anybody out of here, we brought some gas. We will give you one gallon of gas to whoever wants to put whoever in your car and get out of here. Sounds great. I think to myself, I have two trucks. They're not going to give me two gallons of gas. I don't even ask for the gas. I let everybody else take the gas and get out of there. Whoever get out of there, get out of there. I grab some hot food. I go to find that Hispanic guy who I made that phone call, who was in a build relation with. I yell his name, I'm like, hey man, I got some food for you. You know, some hot food because I know he just came and got some salads. I got some hot for you, some hot food. So we can at least eat. He tells me like this, no man, that phone call I made was to my boss. This food is from my boss. This gas is from my boss. You guys eat, you enjoy, get yourself some gas and get out of here. I'm getting out of here. I kind of get out. I know I did not go to give me enough gas. So we wait. Those people come. People leave, they got the gas. Some people didn't. I'm waiting there. I'm thinking we're going to stay here another night. Whatever it is, half hour after that. Half hour after that, my daughter, her birth with my brother, show up with five gallons of gas. That we're here to get you out. My daughter was my hero. Is my hero? Never did you drive around Calcolo. The road was shut down. Nobody in, nobody out. My daughter pulls up with five gallons of gas. I put half in my truck, half in my wife's truck. My wife told me where we're going. We're getting out of here. We're going to Grammol's in Kieh. As we're coming out by Malaya, there's the checkpoints. I tell my wife, stop by this cop. Stop by the cop. I look at him and I tell him, we're leaving. We were just stuck in there. If I go and I get a ton of gas, we let me back in. He said, I cannot do that. I said, so you tell me, all those people trapped in there. Nobody can come and help them. They have to wait till the road is open. The road's still not open today. The road's still up. Tom, I'm going to drive. I'll get to my grandma's. In the morning, my boss texted me. He said, meet me for breakfast. Bring your whole family. You're sitting at the table telling them the story or what just happened. It looks at me and he tells me, what do you need? I said, I need gas cans. There's two in the base charge. Go get them. As you're at breakfast, he empties his wallet and puts it in front of me. I said, I don't want that. I don't need that. He says, I know what you're going to do. Take this. Thank you, boss. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We leave the breakfast and go to go buy gas cans. I went to three stores. I found two one-gallon gas cans with no covers. Call the boss. Boss, there's no gas cans anywhere. I've been to three stores. He says, go get the ones in the base charge. That's all we got. A couple minutes after that, he calls me up. He said, I called service rentals. I put 15 cans of gas in your name. Go get them. Oh my God. I take the gas cans. I get the gas cans. As I'm going to the gas station, my daughter calls me up. She says, what are you doing? Baby, I'm going in. I can get our people out. That I'm coming. I did not question her. I did not deny her. I said, whatever you can in your car, let's go. My cousin went in the day before with one of those restaurants who was delivering hot food. When I got out, I saw his post or whatever. I called him up and said, I'm going in there. If you want to come with me, you can go try whatever. I'm going to go in there. I got some gas. He's like, okay. I get it ready. I call you when I'm ready to go in. I said the same thing. I'm putting gas. I'll call you before we go. I meet you at Malaya. My daughter meets me at the gas station. We drive to Malaya where everybody hikes up. They're parking because they didn't want to drive across the highway. We wait there. I'm not even a minute. I call my cousin. I'm going to the cousin. We're here on the side of the road waiting for you. I met the harbor. We're going in with this construction company. They've got supplies. They've got trailers. We're about to go in right now. Cousin, we're coming. We're at the junction. I never tell him we're coming. So we go, me and my daughter, I tell her, let's go. We go down towards the harbor past the old bus's worth. My cousin is talking to the police. I get right behind him. I beat my horn so he knows I'm there. He points to my truck. Cop. That's the number. What are you doing? Where are you going? I'm with them. I got $300 with a gas and my truck. My daughter's car is filled with water. We're going to go in and help and save our people. It looks at me. It says, okay, be safe. Let's me go. I go in there and my older stepdaughter and her grandpa is still at the gas station where we left. As I go there to make sure they get gas to get out. Well, to wherever they got to go, make sure they're okay. I get to the gas station. I see two cars that was there the night before that took gas. I pull up to the gas station and I said, does anybody need gas to get out of here? I will give you gas. Those two people raise their hand. I told them I was here last night. I saw you take the gas from the lady. I refused the gas from the lady so that you guys could get out and you are still here. Why are you still here? All we only have, I have a tank of gas. We don't want to get stuck. Turn to the other car. Same thing for you. Why are you still here? Oh, we were just waiting for what? Get the hell out of here. What if there's traffic? We don't want to be stuck. I didn't tell them. I was in that corner for two days with you guys. I got out last night. I just came back. There is no traffic leaving behind zero. Get out of here. People hear me yelling at them about this. And I tell anybody, do you need gas? I will give you gas. I will give you gas. Can we get some gas to get out of here? I'm going to go, okay. Turn on your car. Let me see how much gas you have. They turn on the car. 70 miles to empty. Get the hell out of here. I ain't giving you nothing. You will make it to Haliakala with 70 miles in your tank. Tourists come up to me. Can we get some gas? We're trying to get out of here. Wind your flight. Where are you from? Our flight is this afternoon probably two o'clock. How much gas you get? Probably not enough. Let me see. Turn your car on. 12 miles to empty. You ain't making it nowhere. Here's two and a half gallons. I better not see you here tomorrow. Give them the gas. So now I'm trying to hit people. I hear of areas where there's a lot of people. There's people dropping off stuff. I hear I get the intel from the days before. I'm like, okay. I'm not saying those people are good. I'm not. But I know they're getting things. I know people are going there. In my head. What I wanted to get to, or who I wanted to get to, was those people who was not at those areas. Those people who were stranded like me and my own life, who had no miles to get to anywhere. So as I'm going to do a run, check whoever, whatever, whoever, just driving by giving people gas. Drive to an appealing market. I see 10, 15 guys standing around. Two guys with buckets. I'm like, what are they doing? I walk up to them and I see these two brothers with buckets, pumping gas into people's cans. I said, you guys get gas. How you got the gas? Uncle, there was no gas cans. We just bought buckets and we bought it out here. I'm like, what nice. I turn around and go to my truck. I grab a five-dialing gas can and I'm walking back. And they're like, uncle, we almost out. I walk to the bucket and I feel that bucket up. One of my friends sees me, recognizes me. I ask them what you need. They're going to help you guys out. They're like, you know what we need? We need gas for Joey's kitchen. They've been cooking food for everybody in this parking lot. The generator's running out of gas. Here's five gallons. Take it to them. People now see me distributing gas. They're coming up to me like flies. Can we get gas? So this person needs gas and this, and the same story goes. Let me see your gas tank. How much gas you get? I'm waiting, my boss is money. I'm not giving it to nobody who doesn't need it. There's no service. Me and my daughter empty our cars. They're coming back out and getting more gas. More supplies. My friend who lives in Honakowa, was off island for a couple days. He gets home the day of the fire. It cannot go home. Seize my posts. When the first gas I posted, I'm going in and giving people gas, getting people out. He sees my posts. He said, how did you get in? I want to go home. I said, I don't know how I got in. Really? I'm filling up gas and supplies again. I'm going in. Let me know when you're ready. He gets ready. You start going out. Same thing. Nobody can go in. We've seen police escorts going in, whatever. Private cars, whatever. Everybody's saying he can go in. All my friends saying he can go in. I'm not all, sorry. A lot of people have been talking with people seeing me at the gas station, filling my gas. Tell them, let's go. I said, yes, let's go. Hopefully they got their way in. When I called them, I texted them no response. Hopefully they got their mission accomplished. I go in there. My friend has all kinds of stuff. He has people that reached out to him to bring them supplies as well. We do all our stops. Do all his stops. Get them gas and get him home. I come out. This is probably like two in the morning. Coming out of Lahaina. Then I see my brothers post. They go in there with a convoy. He partnered up with this local Hawaiian restaurant. They go and go in and give supplies and water and whatever. In my head, I'm like, perfect. You know, another angel warrior. Great. So in the morning, I call him up. Ta Long brother, if you know of anybody that needs anything, before you guys go at 230, let me come and pick it up. He says, yes, come to our shop. We were just talking to these people in the valley who nobody went up there. They could not get gas for days. They were stuck up there. They reached out to us. They were freaking going and get them supplies. That's why I'm here. One of my friends calls me up. He says, hey man, we're ready to go in. We want to go in. I have two trucks with trailers, 300 gallon water tank, 10 coolers, my kids. So far, besides my cousin, everybody I told to come on and let's go didn't show. I told him, you meet me at this address. We hear loading up. He shows up. When everything he said he has, I didn't plan on having a convoy that day. I didn't plan on taking anybody, but me and my daughter back in that day. We ended up with a five car convoy. I reloaded my gas cans. This was the day they announced. They're going to let the Lahaina residents back in with their IDs. 5,000 cars clogged the road. Cars in accident in a white copoo. We were in Kahlui by Maui Oil. We were like, how the hell are we going to get there? Everybody's asking me how are we going to get there? I don't even know how are we going to get there. We load up. Let's go. We're going to try. No police. Just us. Six cars. Just going. I'm going up to Mawilani. We're not going to make it this way. I told the guys in the back, we have to go down to Kihei. Go up to Shikabeej to get to Malaya. So as we're going on that route, there was an escort by Mudflats. We pull over, we let them pass. I pulled right behind them. I thought everybody turned on your flashes. We're going to make like we're with them. They get to the junction where there's a cop. The escort team talks to the cop. Their last car starts pointing in the back. There's two cars between Mike Crew and that first crew. I could see the guys in the cars, hands start getting erratic. Starts pointing like they're yelling. I could see the cop go like this. You're not going Lahaina. Two cars. So by now he knows you're probably not part of the team. I pulled up to the cop. What you doing? What you going? What you think you're going? I get $300 with a gas from a truck. I get $10,000 with a supplies in these six cars. We get $300 gallons of water. We going in. Get our people out. He goes, be safe. Thank you. That's all of us true. We go in there straight to the valley. Straight to the mountain. We're demanding told us to go. Give them everything they needed or whatever they asked for. Feed up their tanks with gas. Gas cans for the generators. And we start going and we had certain stops. That we requested people, requesting things from us and supplies. I wanted to hit those people. Stay aware of one of those big job zones. Because I heard at this time those big job zones people are getting crazy. They're not asking. They're not sharing. They're not politely grabbing. They're demanding. They're shelving. They're yelling. So I didn't want to take my team there. I have my daughter with me. So we go. And as every stop. I ask my team, is there anybody that reached out to you? That we need to get to? One of the guys is like, yeah, I have this guy up in Cardinal Polly. He's a customer of mine. He's a mechanic. And the customer of mine is an old gentleman. He cannot go nowhere. He stuck up there with no supplies. I said, that's the exact people I want to get to. Get up there. Cardinal Polly. I don't know exactly the name of the street. It's about a coffee farm. You go up there. We deliver the guy's stuff. The guy was there. People walking on the street were asking them what you need. We have water. We have gas. How are you doing? A lady walking. Like probably just for an evening walk, whatever. Says, I just got power. You're like, what? We turn to the guy who we're dropping off stuff. Check your power. You should have power. Turns on his leg. Yes, I have power. Perfect. They're going to get gas again. As we leave in the neighborhood, the neighborhood goes like this and it goes down towards the highway. As soon as we get to this intersection, I see smoke. We were just talking about emptying my friends 300 gallon water tank because we didn't need it. Nobody needed it right then. Whenever we stopped, we wasn't trying to stop and let people shower for whatever. He was just talking about it. I'm going down the hill and I see the smoke. I see the fire. It's in a banana patch. We all know what banana trees look like. How much dead leaves are on banana trees, even when they're growing. Get down there and run to my friend's truck who's just making the turn. I said, I hope you never empty all your water. He's like, why? And then I point to the fire. And he swears. He drives straight down there. He can't get in because there's a gate. I told them I'm going to be back. I got to go tell my friend who I just took home the line before. I have to tell them there is a fire. I'm going to come back. While I was gone, I heard they were trying to fill up their coolers, with water and run it in and peel the fire. It was getting so bad that they left. They said they cannot, what they was doing was nothing. But at the time they run and come back to fire is bigger. So they bailed. I'm glad you guys did. To my friend, the fire is going on. Everybody starts freaking out. I'm like, I don't know, turn on your radio. But we getting out of here. We're not getting stuck again. I'm taking my team and relieving. Be safe. Let me know if you need anything. We come back tomorrow. I get back to my team. And they're waiting now at the bottom of the hill, but the train tracks. Cops blocked the road. Trying to go up. So I'm like talking with them, what are we doing? They're asking me, what are we doing? I telling them, we're getting out of here. Whatever we have left in our trucks, we will take back to the shop and bring back tomorrow. So we leave. We're going. My friend, I got to empty this water. It's dangerous to be driving on the poly with this much water in my tank. Cool. So we go up by the bypass to let some water out. While we're up there, I see my brother's convoy pass us on the bypass. I'm like, no. The smoke in Conopoli is growing. I call my brother off. I'm like, hey, man, are you in that convoy? I see you guys passing. He's like, no, I'm at the shop. But the convoy made it. I'm like, yes, the convoy made it. We just seen them. Tell them to turn around. There's a fire in Conopoli. They cannot turn around. They're being escorted by police. They go all the way to Conopoli. The police turn them around. They made no job that day. But everything back to the shop. If my team didn't make it in there that day, we'd get back to the shop. Everybody's panicking. We've got to assess things. We've got to discuss things. My brother's posting. He's doing his life feed. Open his shop for donations and pickups and whatever. So we just kept going back in and out, trying to supply people, trying to get people out. They're very next trip. They're very next day. They get a call from the unit hall. Saying they have something for me. Which hit my heart. So I come here to pick it up. The convoy leads. I don't want them to wait for me. So they leave. I catch them up on the five mile stretch. See them on the side of the road. There's cars in front of them. And another set of cars. As I'm going, I pass them. Because I'm trying to catch up to them. I pass them. But the time I realized I was already beyond them. So I pull off on the side of the road. I see the first group of cars in front of them. Start to leave and go on the highway. I think I had no idea what was going on. Because I didn't have anybody's number in that convoy. I rolled on the window. Then somebody yells at me. He's like, hey, let's go. And I look up and it's my cousin's boyfriend. I'm like, okay, cool. They're with us. And I turn in the back of my hand. And I see my cousin. His father-in-law coming behind them. So I pull right behind them. Then I see our team coming and leaving. Coming behind. So I call him up. I'm right behind them. I'm like, hey, cousin, what you doing? You know, you guys taking stuff. Hey, how you guys doing? And he knew he was just in there. Stuck. They didn't know what we were doing. But he knew I was stuck in there. He knew I live in there. So you can hear the voices of concern. And making sure we're okay in this and that. And then I'm telling him what we've been doing in this past couple of days. Then he's like, oh, yeah. We're going in with auntie's team. Her medical team were taking the medical supplies. So stay close to us. We'll get you in. I tell them, cousin, you see my truck behind you? That's six cars behind me. And that big box truck. And way in the back. That's our whole team. Then his heart. He could just hear his voice like we'd voice. He's like, yeah, go get them cousin. When we turn off, when we get in, we're going to turn off. And you guys do your thing. So we went in there. There are drops. We got a word, La La Luna neighborhood. Nobody stopped there. One of our guys in the cowboy lives in La La Luna road. So we went up there and we stalked them up. We dropped everything we had at that house. We made sure everybody in that neighborhood knew there was stuff in your neighborhood to go get it. Now we're like, all these drop stations are going to be gold mines. When it comes dark, people are going to come out. So you make sure that the guys are ready. And they're like, no, we're ready. We are equipped and ready. And they tell us there was an incident the night before. That there was a car driving through the neighborhood. After a curfew hours, it circled three times. And they say, when the car stopped within minutes, the police and the SWAT team came out with guns, guns, John asking questions. So we know that they are watching the neighborhood. The mall is finest. Just put a relief on our head. I go in the next day to continue our mission. And I pass these big drop stations. And then I see there is an abundant of supplies starting to come in. I passed by the McDonald's that I was at. And I see people in line. And then there's a long line. And I'm like, what's going on here? So I pulled right up to the person pumping. And I asked him, are you pumping gas? He said, yeah, we're pumping gas. I said, no, are you really pumping gas? He said, yes. And look at the machine, the pump, and the numbers are rolling. That was such a relief to see gas being flowed. As we were driving around, we would see signs of people that have gas. Saying gas here, oh, the community stepped up. And immediately, so when we got back to the shop, I told everybody what I knew, what the gas was pumping, how much stock that there is. So maybe there isn't a need for us to be pumping back and forth. You know, we just wait and see. And we know that people have needs, people know of people who never got to areas. Because some people are still stranded. So we do, we get the messages, and we hear those people. And make sure they can move. The last day I went in was probably yesterday. One of our members on a team, he needed to get in there. His wife is in there. They don't live in there, but they work in there. So they need to get in there. They can't get in there. They have no idea. I said, let's go in there. I'll take you in there. This time we went to Kahakuloa. Because I didn't want to deal with this site anymore. Because it's been getting crazy and stupid. By this time, the Lahaina Resiliency and the Kahakuloa are no stress. When I went that last time, then I saw how much stuff they are getting. And how much we leave they are getting. It was just an heartwarming feeling to see those faces. And those people at those donation stops, casually going through the things. And casually walking away with one case of water. One box of diapers. There wasn't that feeling of panic anymore. So we get to the shop. We just access things. And so now our shop, my brother's shop, is open for donations after 5pm to 8pm. If you want to donate or pick up, it doesn't matter if you live Lahaina, Kahakuloa, Haikul, Hana. If those stores don't have what you want or what you need, and we have it, come and get it. Anybody? We cannot wait for the system to figure things out while we suffer. While we starve, while we die. Sometimes we need immediate action. Sometimes our actions are erratic. But in times when waiting is just as dangerous as a fire burning, you need immediate action. I'm not saying the system is bad. I'm not saying the cops are bad. I'm saying the community, the island of Maui, we spotted the way we were supposed to. The way our ancestors trained us to be. The way our loha should be. At this tragic time, you see who is what? You see who has the colors. And you see who has the dark. I'm not saying I have colors. I'm not saying I'm better than anybody. What I did was nothing special. I feel like what I did was not even close to being enough. What we did was so many needy compared to the trucks I've seen loaded. The 150 gas tanks being pumped into personal vehicles loaded. I have 30 to 40 gallons in my Toyota coma in cans. Our operation was not an official operation. Our operation was built on our loha. Pure aloha. And it's still operating on pure aloha. I'm not saying other people don't have pure aloha. I'm just saying we do. You're doing all of this knowing that your house is gone. So what kind of help do you need in your own? That is the question I've been asked a week. And this is the answer I told everybody. Right now, my family is safe. We have a roof over our head. We have running water and I still have my job. Right now, we have everything we need. I know I will have to restart and rebuild my aloha on my own. But my concern was saving our people. Once I knew my aloha was good and safe, they had a place to go. I had no thought about what I needed. Until my auntie told me they're going to give me something. They're going to give me this, something that people are donating. I told her, no, auntie. I don't need that. We're at grandma's. She says no, Bays. You're here helping everybody. And you have nothing still. You still need the help that hit me like a ton of bricks, not in the wrong way. But that woke me up because I also ever need... I ever need... But it is hard for me to accept and take. When I know so many is in need. I would give anyone everything I have and walk away with nothing. I'd be happy about it. The lovers I have, my family. All I have to do is gas station. After a man becomes a man, and he builds his relationships with his friends and his community. That man really is no longer helpless. That man really has the help he needs in his pocket. He can call for the help he needs. All sitting at that gas station for two days, I have never felt so helpless in my life. I couldn't call nobody. I know if I could have called somebody, you would have been gone. I couldn't call nobody. I could not do anything. Never felt like that in my life. That's all I got. If we could close this one, for folks who don't have that relationship with Hawaii or just don't understand what Ohan is, just explain to us what outside myth your community is. How devastating this tragedy has been for all of us. The community of Lahaina is so tight-knit that not even a raging fire could destroy it. The island of Maui is so strong that when you need, no force can stop it. We was not to be denied to help our people no matter what color you uniform. Not to disrespect anybody in uniform. The response of this community and it was not just me, our team. I've seen other teams, soldiers coming in by land, by boat, by jet ski, from other islands even, from Vegas things been coming in, from Oregon, California. This community is beyond Hawaii. There is nothing that would break Lahaina. It might bend, it might burn. Lahaina would not be broken. I still have friends calling me, texting me, asking me what they need, telling me if I have this at the shop. Of course I do, or maybe we don't, I don't know, but if we do, you will get it. I have other friends who's asking me, how can I get in? I have building materials, I am ready. Let me know. I too can build. So as a whole, we can rebuild Lahaina. We all can. That's it man, I think that's all I got. It's not even a crazy one man. See stories of people burning, stories of people floating. Without my boss. Without my boss, I could not do my mission. What you did to me? How many people total in Lahaina? When we drove away, it was just me, my wife and my son. My stepdaughter was with her grandpa and Hawaiian homes, and they followed us out. Everybody else, my family is on this side. My wife's family was still on the other side. A lot of them are still on the other side. So people have to stay on the other side, because they still have a job, and their house is still standing. So what do they do? With your family safe, even with everything that's happened, you consider yourself lucky. I mean, yeah, I feel blessed. I feel blessed to get everybody out. I feel blessed that we had a home to go to, to run to family out here worrying. I just worried about the ones we didn't get to. About the ones we could not save. And I hear those stories, and I see those videos. I've never seen a TV report till today. I've never sat down and watched the TV since this happened. I have no idea what they're saying. Nor do I care. So we had to go through our list of our members and we had to go through our list of guys who are living in LaHina. We'd go down the list and recall our members. Some would answer, some wouldn't answer, because there was no cell service. And when they answered the phone, there's one of those biggest reliefs in the world. They're in their family right. They're asking them questions about your family right. They have a place to stay, they have food, what do you need? We couldn't find people. We didn't know where they are. We couldn't get in touch with them. And these are our members that we've actually worked with forever. And worrying about them in LaHina, knowing that they could be stuck out there, without any food or anything. But we stayed at the office to make sure if anyone came here, we were able to help them, give them whatever they want. We knew that some of their phones weren't working, so we were here for them. When they came in, the thing that we learned here is when we wanted to ask them questions, but it was more listen to their stories. Because I mean, they were going through pain, they were feeling all things that they went through were hard for them. And just for us to listen, sometimes for these people as a first-under-tellner story was important. Let them release some of the pain that they weren't going through. You could see it, you could feel it. And there is no words to comfort these people. There wasn't. It was like, you just listen to what they had to say. And let them know if they need anything that will be here for them. And that was important. And if they're family and they're anything they need. And we were here all those days after. We wouldn't need because we had to make sure that we were here for them. We were worried about where they could stay. We actually set it up. Right parry to this. We had a place for them to stay. Not for this, not for this event itself. It's because we're short in manpower. So we actually got an apartment for them or for workers. And as soon as this happened, we called group builders, let them know, can we get this apartment earlier? Can we get them some help for the people that are out in Alhina? We had workers at the Royal Alhina that were just wanted to get home back to Oahu. But they needed to shower. So we called to see if this apartment building was available to them. So calling group builders, they said sure, bring them by. They can use it a couple of days earlier than we had projected. And what do you think the need is going to be medium term, long term for the members, particularly those that lost their homes? The ones that lost their home right now, all of our members are staying with family. Most of them are all safe in song, but they're with family. But as time goes on, no matter how good it might be, it becomes trying for the family. So we're going to have to find places for these families in case anything happens within their family. And you know, disruptions in the house are just staying there sometimes can be difficult. So if they have another outlet that they can go to, that'll be wonderful so that they can get out of that situation. I mean, right now we're worried about them. They're well-being. We're making sure that they're okay and they're all not okay. They're all going through a traumatic thing. They're all still in shock. They don't know how to deal with this. And right now there's no way to deal with this. They've got kids who want to go to school, can't go to school. You know, they're having to rely on their family for a home, you know, to stay at home. For me, I got my sister, my sister's very below me. Her family, the husband lost his house, the son lost his house, and the son's wife's family all lost their houses. So my sister has three families living in her house right now. So we do what we can, bring food and stuff like that. But that's just our situation. I'm sure that's happening all around Maui with other people. And you know, there's a lot of a low-how there, where they're welcoming families in. And I guess keeping these families stable through these rough times will be the biggest goal for us and for everybody. Showing them a low-how and they're going to get frustrated, for us, come sadness, and then after that is anger because they don't know what to do. And if we can be there to help them so they don't go through this, they'll be wonderful. That would be our biggest job right now. Finally, Ivan, when you hear someone like Warner that lost their home, but yet he's out there helping the extended, line of family. What does that say about the type of quality people that we have in here? Well, that shows that it's not just about them. It's about helping people. They put themselves forward before other people, and before themselves to help other people, which is really important because, you know, if you're going to have a society that survives, you're going to work together and make it happen. And Warner was out there not even listening to what other people were telling him, but doing what was right. And that's important. Do it what's right, and you know, give what you can. Anything else you wanted to add? Well, I hope that everybody on Maui, we get through this. It's going to be very difficult trying times ahead. We're just at the start right now. We're going to have to deal with people who have passed away. We're going to have to deal with causing people. We're going to have to deal with building up the Maui again. And all this isn't going to happen overnight, but it's going to take all of us helping each other over here on Maui to get it to go in and right direction.