Particulate matter (PM) is a chemical composition of smoke, including sulfates, carbon, nitrates, or mineral dusts. It stems from vehicle and industrial emissions and other fossil fuel burning, and researchers are now increasingly examining wildfires and the effects of longterm exposure to wildfire smoke that affect respiratory illnesses and other impacts to human health.
A subset of PM — fine particulate matter (PM2.5) — is especially dangerous to human health because it’s 30 times thinner than a human hair and can not only lodge in lung tissue but also cross into the brain after it’s inhaled.
Scientists from the University of Michigan have identified a link between agriculture and wildfire PM2.5 emissions and the onset of dementia among 27,857 adult Americans, with data drawn from the national Health and Retirement Study. Pollution estimates were based on the locations of the participants, who were older than 50 and did not have dementia at the outset. About 15 percent of the study participants developed dementia, but the rate of cognitive decline was significantly greater in the areas of high PM2.5 concentration between 1998 and 2016.
The New York Times reported today that fatalities resulting from the Maui fires have surpassed that of the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California, and now mark the deadliest wildfire since the 1918 Cloquet inferno in Minnesota killed hundreds of people.
The island’s fatality count has already hit 93, according to an AP report earlier today, and both locals and experts are pleading with tourists from the U.S. mainland and elsewhere to cancel vacation plans and spare locals and emergency responders the drain on scarce resources. Hotels and other lodging options on Maui are scrambling to shelter evahttps://youtu.be/OlV6sObu_Y0cuees and the suddenly homeless; well over 45,000 residents and visitors have departed Kahului Airport in West Maui since Wednesday.
Mayor Richard Bissen recorded a public message, and the Maui County website is loaded with additional resources. A Family Assistance Center is open at Kahului Community Center at 275 Uhu Street.
The Maui Emergency Management Agency can help in locating unaccounted-for family members. People trying to locate loved ones also can call the American Red Cross at 800-733-2767.
“The collective resources and attention of the federal, state, and county government, the West Maui community, and the travel industry must be focused on the recovery of residents who were forced to evacuate their homes and businesses,” announced the Hawaii Tourism Authority today. Visitors are encouraged to change plans and travel to Hawaii’s other islands.
Gov. Josh Green said 500 hotels rooms will be set aside for evacuated locals, and the state is working with AirBNB to make more rentals available for locals. Another 500 hotel rooms will be reserved for FEMA employees; no word on whether interagency IMTs from the U.S. will be able to camp in tents as usual.
Recovery crews with cadaver dogs have covered just under 5 percent of the fires’ search area thus far, according to Maui Police Chief John Pelletier. “We’ve got an area that we have to contain that is at least 5 square miles, and it is full of our loved ones,” he said. He asked residents with missing loved ones to provide DNA samples at a county resource center.
Hawaii News Now reported that Gov. Green said this will certainly be the worst natural disaster Hawaii has ever faced. “I hurt to imagine the fear that went through people when a fire — really a hurricane and a fire — came through all at once,” he said. Their news conference is available online: youtube.com/watch?v=zm_xx5peLJQ
Naka Nathaniel is an opinion columnist for Honolulu Civil Beat.
In Hawai’i this summer, we would glance at the news from the rest of the country and be grateful that we weren’t suffering under the extreme weather — heat domes, deluges or smoke-filled skies — that other parts of the world were experiencing. We remained sheltered in our corner of paradise.
But “paradise” was a marketing ploy, never the truth nor a guarantee.
Today, Hawai’i is reeling and in shock. The rising death toll — currently standing at 55 — from wildfires that are raging across Maui, is simply soul-crushing.
Maui County officials closed all roads to public use in the town of Lahaina as wildfires on the Hawaiian island burned out of control, driven by high winds that the Associated Press said gusted over 60 mph. Hurricane Dora has passed to the south of the islands at a distance of nearly 500 miles, but extreme conditions and violent winds across the islands resulted in numerous power outages late Tuesday; firefighters struggled to reach areas cut off by downed trees and powerlines.
The National Weather Service said Hurricane Dora’s winds knocked out power and grounded firefighting helicopters.
West Maui is closed off to all traffic, according to a CNN report from Maui County. Only emergency personnel are allowed access to that part of the island.
The BBC reported that some residents were forced to jump into the ocean ahead of racing flames; the Coast Guard said at least a dozen people were rescued from the water. Local media reported “apocalyptic scenes” in the historic town of Lahaina, parts of which were destroyed or severely damaged. The Lahaina fire is one of at least seven now burning in the state.
A local CBS affiliate reported that dozens of homes and businesses were destroyed on the western part of the island of Maui, the second largest and third most populated island in the state. HawaiiNewsNow reported that witnesses described apocalyptic scenes Tuesday. Residents say an overwhelmed fire force, fighting flames all day in powerful winds, could do little as flames ripped through Lahaina.
Videos from the island show the historic town’s main street and local businesses burning. “Buildings on both sides were engulfed,” local business owner Alan Dickar told CBS.
“Hawaii National Guardsmen have been activated and are currently on Maui assisting Maui Police Department at traffic control points,” said Maj. Gen. Kenneth Hara, Hawaii’s adjutant general. The overnight deployment was hastened by the dynamic fire conditions, and additional National Guard personnel are expected to arrive in Maui and Hawaii counties later Wednesday, Hara said.
Lt. Governor Sylvia Luke, who is acting while Gov. Josh Green is traveling out of state, issued an emergency proclamation Tuesday that activated the Guard. Updated road closures and other emergency notices are posted on the County of Maui facebook page.
A 215-acre wildfire in San Jacinto County was contained on August 2 according to a report by ABC-13 News. That afternoon, resources were requested from Texas A&M Forest Service (TAMFS) on the Snowhill Fire. Shortly after 1 p.m. crews on the fire reported moderate to high fire behavior with several structures threatened, evacuations under way, and road closures in place.
The agency also reported that two of its firefighters suffered burn injuries when fire behavior intensified at about 5 p.m.
The agency’s 24-hour report noted that fire behavior intensified on a part of the fire where a dozer crew was working. The two injured firefighters were not wearing PPE properly and both experienced first- and second-degree burns to the face, hands, and sides.
The two firefighters were transported to a hospital and both were treated and released.
Two days later the agency released its 72-hour report on an aircraft incident in Travis County.
On August 1 at about 10:30 p.m. an air tactical aircraft working a different fire was involved in an incident at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport — about 5 miles southeast of downtown Austin — after flying the Powder Keg Pine Fire near Bastrop, about 150 miles southwest of Lake Livingston near the location of the Snowhill Fire.
TAMFS resources were requested on August 1 on the Powder Keg Pine Fire in Bastrop County. Numerous aircraft were dispatched, including the Air Attack Platform at the Gillespie County Airport in Fredericksburg. The aircraft is a King Air C90A turboprop registered to Safford Aviation Service in Coolidge, Arizona (which had not yet replied to a request for comment when this was posted).
At about 8:40 p.m. the aircraft was released from the fire and made a 30-minute flight back to the Gillespie County Airport. On approach, though, the pilot and ATGS reported an issue with landing gear indicators; just two of the three indicated that the landing gear was down and locked. The pilot and ATGS attempted to fix the issue manually, and at about 9:30 p.m. they reported they had two hours of fuel left and intended to fly to Austin-Bergstrom, an FAA-controlled airport, where they’d do fly-bys so the control tower could see whether the landing gear was actually down. After two fly-bys, the tower told them it appeared to be down, and they approached for landing.
Upon landing the aircraft, though, the right landing gear collapsed, and the right propeller blades contacted the concrete and were damaged. The right gear appeared to have collapsed back into the aircraft gear hold, according to the report.
Neither the pilot nor the ATGS was injured and no civilians were injured. Both the pilot and ATGS were in constant radio communication with TAMFS dispatch in College Station, and the aircraft was tracked using the real-time map-based Automated Flight Following (AFF) system. The NTSB will investigate.
Spectrum News reported that Texas A&M Forest Service, the state’s lead agency for wildfire response, on Monday raised the state’s preparedness level to 4 — its second-highest level. The agency said over the past seven days it has responded to 80 wildfires burning 8,521 acres, with 41 fires since Friday.
The forecast for this week calls for more triple-digit temperatures with few chances for rain, and 164 Texas counties are now under burn bans.
THIS IS a temporary post,
in the aftermath of numerous fatalities on fires this season,
and considering the comments posted publicly on both sites and the piles of emails I’m getting privately from readers,
and I’d really like for all of our readers to review these two posts,
both written by Bill Gabbert and fully endorsed today by me.
Scientists from the University of Michigan have identified a link between agriculture and wildfire PM2.5 emissions and the onset of dementia among 27,857 adult Americans, with data drawn from the national Health and Retirement Study. Pollution estimates were based on the locations of the participants, who were older than 50 and did not have dementia at the outset. About 15 percent of the study participants developed dementia, but the rate of cognitive decline was significantly greater in the areas of high PM2.5 concentration between 1998 and 2016.
