Fire rages in Pahala

UPDATE: A large brush fire that has forced the closure of Highway 11 near Pahala has jumped across the highway, burning a few acres on the mauka side of the road, and is only 40 percent contained, Assistant Fire Chief Aaron Arbles said this morning.

“Fire has increased to a little over 4,000 acres. It has jumped the road at the 49 mile marker,” Arbles said. Bulldozer units are being redeployed to create new fire breaks.

One home has been threatened, but firefighters were on scene and were able to extinguish nearby fires, preventing damage. No structures have been burned and no injuries are reported, but the extent of damage to macadamia nut and coffee orchards and pasture land has not been determined.

Pahala town is not threatened.

“The road is still closed,” Arbles said, and it has been since last night.

A fire mauka of Pahala that has burned 400 acres is 95 percent contained.

Conditions in Pahala have been improved with the dissipation of smoke that has plagued it throughout the day.

Summer school classes at Ka‘u High and Pahala Elementary have been canceled for a second day.

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By JOHN BURNETT

Tribune-Herald staff writer

Firefighters spent a second day on Tuesday battling a wildfire that has all but paralyzed Pahala, as well as a smaller brushfire a few miles to the north.

Police closed Hawaii Belt Road (Highway 11) at about 1 p.m. It remained closed Tuesday evening between the 46-mile marker and Kamani Street in Pahala town.

At about 2 p.m., Police Capt. Andrew Burian and Sgt. Cory Koi of Ka‘u Patrol kept tabs on the blaze near the 50-mile marker of the highway, as county and National Park Service firefighters battled the inferno a couple of hundred yards away.

“We’re just trying to ensure, as much as possible, that people are safe and if we can get the traffic going to some extent, that’s what we’ll do, but really, we’d rather have people avoid the area if at all possible,” Burian said.

Koi surveyed an overcast sky that hinted of sorely needed rain, but had so far failed to deliver on the promise.

“The thing that’s ironic about this is that in Naalehu, it’s pouring,” he said with a rueful smile.

Michael Worthington of Pahala said on Tuesday evening he went to Hilo earlier in the day. When he returned in mid afternoon, he had to detour through Kapapala Ranch.

“(It was) definitely a 20-minute delay, even though things were moving along. They’d take eight cars at a time back and forth,” he said. “…Police were escorting groups of eight cars at a time back and forth. … They were asking people, ‘Are you a Pahala resident?’ I said yes. I don’t know if they were only allowing Pahala residents through or everyone. Kapapala Ranch is on state land. They kind of use it as an easement when there’s an emergency.”

The family of Air Force Staff Sgt. Justin Roden of Hickam Air Force Base on Oahu wasn’t quite as fortunate.

He, his wife Charee, and their infant daughter, Aly, had driven Tuesday morning from Kona, where they’re staying, to visit Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. They took the southern route, through Pahala, and saw the fire.

“It wasn’t so bad then, just a little bit of smoke,” he said. “And then hours later we’re on our way back and it’s pretty bad.”

The Rodens were unable to use the same return route to Kona as their rented sport-utility vehicle was turned back by state Highways workers at the 49-mile marker.

Assistant Fire Chief Glen Honda said at about 7:45 p.m. that the main fire had blackened about 4,000 acres.

“Where the fire jumped the road at the 49-mile marker, (firefighters are) concentrating their efforts to make sure that doesn’t spread up on the mauka side of the road,” he said. “So they’re trying to knock that out before it gets any bigger.”

Honda said that as of press time, no structures had been consumed by the fire. According to a written Fire Department press release, the fire appears to have started in a macadamia nut orchard, and the cause is still under investigation.

Some 30 firefighters were poised to stay the night to continue to battle the blazes, Honda said. Motorists are asked to avoid the area, even if road closures are lifted, because of crews working.

The second fire, which broke out Monday afternoon along Cane Haul Road above Pahala, has burnt about 400 acres, Honda said, adding the department estimates it is about 60 percent contained. That blaze, as of press time, did not appear to be spreading.

Ka‘u Hospital reopened its emergency room at about 7 p.m. Tuesday, said Merilyn Harris, the hospital’s administrator. Volunteers and employees spent the day airing out the building as well as cleaning soot left by the smoke.

Julia Neal, operator of Pahala Plantation Cottages, said that coffee farmers at Pear Tree above Pahala feared they had lost their farms to the fire on Monday night thate.

“When they went up to their coffee farms this (Tuesday) morning, they found that the flames that had went through (Monday) night had raced through the farms, around the trees, burned grass, singed (the trees) and damaged some of the limbs, but most of the coffee was still left,” she said. “There are some farms that are more damaged than others.”

Chris Manfredi, manager of Ka‘u Farm and Ranch Co., said there’s “some real concern there’s gonna be some loss of homes” and said that “two fires sprouting up simultaneously” seems suspicious.

“Everybody’s just frustrated and angry,” he said. “These fires have been sprouting up time to time for years and there never seems to be any resolution to it. This time, they encircled the town of Pahala. They’re on the Hilo side, the mauka side, the makai side. … People were leaving their homes; some of our coffee farms were damaged. Lives and livelihoods are at risk for no good reason.

“… I don’t know the cause of the fires; I just hope the Fire Department and the police are investigating the cause. It could be natural causes, but I think we need to know.”

Chelsea Jensen of Stephens Media contributed. Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.