As people in Maui continue to recover from the deadliest wildfires in the U.S. in the last century, a fire official from the East Bay is there helping with search and recovery efforts.
Jeff Peter has over three decades of experience in California’s fire service, having worked in San Diego 30 years before joining the Contra Costa County Fire Protection District, where he serves as an assistant fire chief. He’s been involved with the National Urban Search and Rescue system since 1995 and has been across the country to respond to natural disasters.
Peter talks with KQED’s Rachael Vazquez about the state of recovery efforts in Maui, and what Bay Area emergency officials can learn from the devastating fires.
Below is an extended version of the interview, edited for brevity and clarity.
You’ve been in Maui for two weeks. Can you tell us what you saw when you first got there? How have things changed?
It’s similar to many of the devastating fires we’ve had in California. Many of the structures are very close together in the Lahaina area and we saw about 80% of these residential structures and commercial structures completely burned to the ground. It’s definitely a tragic incident. The devastation is significant, and unfortunately the life loss is high, as many of your viewers have seen. So it’s tough, because it’s such a beautiful place, but a pretty devastating disaster.
Having been there a few weeks now, what kind of work are you and your team focusing on?
I’ve been in Maui since the morning of August 11. My team is one of three management teams that manage the 28 National Urban Search and Rescue teams across the country. As the federal partners, we’re always there to serve the local authorities, whether it be a city, county or a state. My role is as a liaison officer and my team coordinates the work with the local authorities so we can then manage our task forces that are here at the incident to perform their work.
Despite all of your experience, is it still hard for you personally to see all of the devastation that you’re seeing in Maui now?
Yeah, it is. It’s really tough work physically and emotionally for our people and our rescue specialists. My first response was to 9/11. I’ve been to Hurricane Sandy, Matthew, Harvey, Irma, the Miami condo collapse and now Lahaina. It certainly is devastating. Personally I have a connection to Lahaina, I’ve been here many times, so it definitely connects you to the disaster for sure. But with our people, their passion is to help people in their time of need, and our folks get great value in finding and searching for remains to help those that lost their loved ones be able to begin the grieving process and to provide them some comfort.
What kinds of things do you do to find the energy to keep going back to scenes like this over the years?
Well, I think it’s just the average wiring of a public safety person, whether it be a firefighter or a law enforcement person. Most of us just have an inner passion to help and serve the public when they’re truly in need.
How have you seen wildfires change over the course of your career?
Those of us in the fire service are continuing to see significant fires in California, both in Northern and Southern California. Now, unfortunately, in Hawaii as well. And as we continue to build more and more homes out in what’s called the Wildland-Urban Interface, and as we get fire weather associated with low relative humidity or increased winds, it becomes very challenging to deal with wildland fires.
California has a lot of experience with wildfires. And as the climate continues to change, there could be more places that need to draw on that expertise. What goes through your mind when you think about more frequent, more intense wildfires becoming a reality in more places?
Yeah, it is becoming a reality, as you mentioned. I think preparedness is extremely important for all citizens, to make sure they’ve got as much defensible space around their homes as possible and that they’re prepared in the event of a wildfire to evacuate, gather up their loved ones, any belongings that are critical. And then we in public safety need to make sure that we’re prepared and adequately staffed and have enough resources to handle significant incidents. We are very lucky in the state of California that we have a very robust mutual aid system where we can move fire resources up and down the state routinely for bigger fires and to help all of our partners across the state.