LISA VORPAHL, a bank teller, woke to the sound of someone shuffling on her lanai, a Hawaiian-style patio. It was 3 a.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 8, 2023. She looked out her bedroom window along a dry, grassy slope overlooking her slice of tropical paradise in Lahaina, Hawaii, and realized it was just the wind.
Alexa Caskey couldn't sleep either. On the farm where she grew taro and breadfruit for her plant-based restaurant, she listened to gusts that would soon dislodge her garage door and topple the Hong Kong orchid tree outside.
Photographer Rachael Zimmerman woke up before dawn in her condo on Front Street, Lahaina's seaside boulevard of restaurants and surf shops, to howls rattling her window screens.
If there was any warning on that fitful night that Hawaii was about to endure one of the most horrific and deadly natural disasters in the state's history, it was only the wind.
For two days, the National Weather Service in Honolulu had been sending
out ominous alerts about powerful easterly gusts, whipped up by Hurricane Dora passing 500 miles to the south. The gusts hit Maui at a time when much of the tropical island had been parched by severe drought, including the drier leeward side that includes Lahaina.
The next time Vorpahl woke up, she smelled smoke. The power was out.
A fire had started in the dry grass near her home on Lahainaluna Road, on a slope just east of the highway that bypasses downtown. Power poles had fallen in the neighborhood, and wires had snapped-leading several neighbors to later question whether electrical equipment had started the blaze.
Maui County authorities got the first reports of the fire at 6:37 a.m., and not long afterward, police were circulating in Vorpahl's neighborhood, calling out on megaphones for people to evacuate. Using a nearby hydrant, firefighters doused the flames.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 2023 - January 2024 من Reader's Digest US.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 2023 - January 2024 من Reader's Digest US.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Election Day Memories - Stories about voting by the people, for the people
A Convincing Argument When my boyfriend and I were finally old enough to vote in our first presidential election, we spent months debating with one another about our chosen candidates. We were quite persuasive, as we discovered when we got home from the polls and learned that we'd both voted for the other's initial choice.―SHERRY FOX Appleton, WI
A New Way to Monitor Blood Sugar
Who can benefit from this wearable technology
A Flag for Dad
An old sailor made a last wish. His son was determined to see that it came true.
Sisterhood to Last a Lifetime
These college pals teach a master class in how to maintain a friendship for 50-plus years
...TO DIE ON A HOCKEY RINK
ONE MINUTE I WAS PLAYING IN MY BEER LEAGUE, THE NEXT I WAS IN THE HOSPITAL
Yes, There's a Museum for That!
These collections are wacky, wonderful and worth a visit
Town Meeting Is Called!
Once a year, the people of Elmore, Vermont, gather to practice a cherished right: democracy
Just Tight
Broken, battered and trapped in a ravine for days, a desperate driver wonders, \"Will anyone find me?\"
WHY OUR BODIES DON'T DIG DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME
Twice a year, when we spring ahead and fall back, we're more prone to sleepiness, depression and accidents
MONEYSAVING DO'S AND DON'TS
The run-up to the holidays doesn't have to bah-humbug your budget. A shopping expert shares strategies for saving big now and all year round.