Biden pledges immediate help for Hawaii wildfires survivors

Washington, The Gulf Observer: President Joe Biden spoke about the Hawaii wildfires while traveling in Utah, pledging that federal disaster response will ensure that “anyone who’s lost a loved one, or who’s home has been damaged or destroyed, is going to get help immediately.”

Biden promised to streamline requests for federal assistance and said that the Federal Emergency Management Agency was “surging emergency personnel” on Maui. He also ordered all available Coast Guard and Air Force personnel on the island to work with the Hawaii National Guard to help.

“Our prayers are with the people of Hawaii. But not just our prayers. Every asset we have will be available to them,” he said.

Officials are still trying to get a handle on the fires’ progress but know that they’re not fully contained, Hawaii Emergency Management spokesman Adam Weintraub in Honolulu said.

“We are still in life preservation mode. Search and rescue is still a primary concern,” he said. “Our search and rescue teams from Maui and supporting agencies are not able to do their job until the fire lines are secure and they’re sure that they’re going to be able to get to those areas safely.”

He asked the world for patience as officials try to get control of the crisis

“I think that there is a great temptation to shift immediately to what went wrong, who’s to blame. What we have here is a natural disaster,” he said. “There may have been questions that need to be examined about whether it was handled in the right way. But we still got people in danger. We still have people who don’t have homes. We still have people who can’t find their loved ones.”