Paradise has been scorched.
Multiple wildfires fueled by winds from Hurricane Dora ripped through historic Lahaina in West Maui reducing the popular tourist town to rubble.
Wyeth Collo of Honolulu was flying out of San Jose Thursday after visiting family.
He’s part of a non-profit called Chef Hui which prepares meals for those in crisis on the islands.
He says he’ll start helping as soon as his flight touches down Thursday, whether it’s for people in Lahaina, or those who were evacuated to Oahu.
“It's heartbreaking. You feel for everyone, but I know everyone’s going to come in strong to support the community. That’s what we do,” said Collo.
While he heads in to help, a steady stream of travelers are arriving back at SFO with harrowing first hand accounts of the island fires.
“We were waiting for it to calm down. Then we starting hearing about the fumes coming closer to us,” said Selin Uyarer of San Jose.
She and her family were staying in downtown Lahaina and made the quick decision to evacuate.
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They later found out the place they had rented went up in flames.
“At the beginning we didn’t believe that everything was going to burn down all the downtown, we just wait,” said Uyarer.
And it hits hard for people like Desiree Baker who’s lived in Maui for almost 50 years.
She was on a connecting flight through SFO Thursday morning and fears what she’ll return to.
“I cried all day yesterday. We don’t know what’s going to happen and it’s a long term effect. This is the worst ever. I just talked to someone on Maui and they say it reminds them of Hiroshima, it's horrible,” said Baker.
The direct flight to Maui Thursday had just 50 people on it, but multiple airlines are still flying in even if the planes are empty – to help get people off the island.
“I’ve never been frightened this way, I thought this may be it,” said Juancho Libiran of Union City.
The Libiran family was just a few minutes away from the town now turned into ashes. They were stuck in a resort with no power, no communication and food was running low.
“Looking out the window you can see the fire raging, raging really hard,” Libiran said.
On Wednesday night, the Libiran family was asked to evacuate to the nearest shelter before heading to the airport.
At the same time, Livermore resident Selena and her family were trying to seek refuge and a flight home.
“I’m still so emotional because we still have family there,” she said.
Selena says that she was running out of food for her baby and flights were full, forcing half of her family had to stay behind.
“We had got back to the safer side because we still had family in the Lahaina side. My husband had to go back to Lahaina to give them gas and get the rest of the family back to the safe side,” she said.
