The smoke was starting to blot out the sun. Winds were howling, and heat bore down as flames licked the trees on the horizon. The power had been out all day, so Mike Cicchino thought he’d drive to the hardware store for a generator. He turned off his street, and in an instant, his Lahaina neighborhood seemed to spiral into a war zone.
“When I turned that corner, I see pandemonium,” he said. “I see people running and grabbing their babies and screaming and jumping in their cars.”
It was around 3:30 p.m. Tuesday when Cicchino and his neighbours began a desperate fight for their lives.