A B.C. family has lost their home in Maui due to the wildfire that burned in the community of Lahaina.
The Toths, Ginger and Jason, have lost their dream vacation home, retirement plans and years of memories.
“We were wondering about our place. Somebody sends a photo to us and it was like a 100-foot-tall inferno … I said it’s our house, it’s our neighbourhood,” Jason said.
“It was all gone … all gone,” Ginger told Global News.
The Toths split their time between Tsawwassen and the Hawaiian island.
On Tuesday night, they watched the horror unfold from B.C. and Wednesday morning, and were heartbroken when they received a photo of their Maui home.
“We are feeling bad for ourselves, then it’s like we got to snap out of it. Then we are feeling bad for everyone else,” Jason said.
“A cascading layer upon layer of devastation.”
Jason and Ginger consider themselves lucky, as they were insured and, more importantly, alive.
They’re now focusing all the energy on helping the community of Lahaina.
The family says they’re fundraising for the devastated community.
The death toll from the wildfire that razed the historic Maui town has climbed to 93.
Authorities have warned that the effort to find and identify the dead is still in its early stages. The blaze is already the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century.
Crews with cadaver dogs have covered just 3 per cent of the search area, Maui Police Chief John Pelletier said Saturday.
At least 2,200 buildings were damaged or destroyed in West Maui, nearly all of them residential.
Across the island, the damage is estimated at around $6 billion USD.
— with files from Associated Press