I'm Michael McCartney from Lāhainā and while still attempting to raise funds for Maui wildfire survivors, it was heartbreaking to see the devastating flooding damage from the Kona storm as our community was struggling to rebuild. First the wildfires took everything and now the heavy rain and winds during the month of March. Two weeks of the Kona storm was brutal to not just Maui, but Oahu, Moloka'i and the Big Island. With sixty-two inches of rain on Maui and an estimated more than two trillion gallons of water, enough to fill three million Olympic-sized swimming pools, inundated Hawaiʻi in March to overwhelm many residents. The accumulated rainfall over fourteen days reached as high as 3,000% of normal historical levels for this time of year, culminating in a destructive “rain bomb” over the islands. The last estimated damage was over one billion dollars at the time of this fundraiser. The second smaller photograph was taken in my neighborhood as the flooding of water and mud traveled from the area above where temporary shelter homes were built after the wildfires, began to overflow with serious ponding resulting in lakes, streams and rivers threatening not only the temporary homes built for wildfire survivors, but also some of the properties below that were rebuilding homes. This is just one of many areas throughout the island and neighbor islands dealing with the aftermath.
Looking to raise funds to help out families immediately struggling with the horrible scenario in our community.
If you would consider helping, it would be so appreciated.
*If you feel you would like to help others in a different way, I suggest any of the fundraisers below (the home washing away in the photograph was the home of the Carrie and Tom Bashaw and their GoFundMe is listed at the very bottom of this list):