By An aerial image taken on August 10th, 2023, shows destroyed homes and buildings on the waterfront burned to the ground in Lahaina in the aftermath of wildfires in western Maui, Hawaii. | Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP via Getty Images
Maui faces a long road to recovery from the devastating blazes this week — Hawaii’s deadliest natural disaster since 1960. At least 55 people have died. Lahaina, the capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom for a time before the US annexed the islands in 1898, is still smoldering.
Fire experts in Hawaii knew the land was primed to burn. It hasn’t always been that way; fire risk arrived on the islands relatively recently in Hawaii’s history. That risk is growing, but there’s a lot that communities can do to adapt.
To understand how fire came to be a looming threat in Hawaii and what to do about it, The Verge spoke with Elizabeth Pickett, co-executive director of the Hawaii Wildfire Management Organization. The nonprofit organization works with…