‘Frightening, life-altering;’ Local man recounts escaping deadly Maui wildfires

BUTLER COUNTY — Almost 100 people have died in the wildfires raging across the Hawaiian Island of Maui.

An area man traveling to Maui recalled how scary the experience was as he watched the town burn and wondered how he would get home.

J.D. Leininger went to Maui with seven other people last week.

His group made it home by flying to Dayton, Columbus, and Cincinnati.

The journey to get back home wasn’t easy, but what he witnessed he said will change his life.

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Cell phone video captures the orange haze in the night sky when the fires broke out in the historic town of Lahaina.

“I don’t know that I have words to describe it, to be honest with you, frightening, life-altering, not just for me but for the poor people of Lahaina, for the people of Maui,” Leininger said.

Leininger was with family and friends a few miles north of Lahaina.

The wildfires gutted the Maui town.

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“As soon as I saw that first cloud of smoke, that’s when I was like, ‘man, we’re in for it. This is, we’re in survival now.,” he said. “It’s not ‘What are we going to do tomorrow? Is the luau going to be canceled? Are we still going to get to go snorkel?’ This is ‘where we’re going to find our food. Where are we going to find water? How are we going to get to safety?’”

Leininger’s group lost electricity and water in their condo and eventually knew they had to leave.

“We checked out as a 45-minute drive, took us about an hour. You just watched the mountainsides glow, burnt structures and it was rough. I mean, it smelled like.. it’s like the most fireworks and burnt plastic and the most pungent, horrible smell I’ve ever smelled my entire life,” he said.

The group slept in cars and even had a restaurant server offer them a place to stay until they could get a flight home.

“What we witnessed was an absolute tragedy,” Leininger said. “We got to enjoy coming home and our families and some people didn’t get that. And that’s, you know, that’s the thing that I will never ever in my life be able to push to the side and not think about.”

Leininger and his wife made it home Saturday.

He was grateful to come home and see his two children.

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