With drought conditions worsening and wildfires already occurring across the islands, state and county officials are launching an awareness effort ahead of what forecasters warn could be an especially dangerous dry season.
The 10th annual Wildfire &Drought LOOKOUT ! campaign kicked off Wednesday on Kauai, as emergency responders and climate experts sounded the alarm on Hawaii’s growing vulnerability to fast-moving, wind-driven fires.
Genki Kino, a forecaster with the National Weather Service, said this year’s wet season brought little rainfall across most of the state, making conditions the second-driest in the past 30 years.
“Drought conditions have already developed across all of Maui County and the Big Island, where vegetation has dried out and browned and become more receptive to wildfire ignitions, ” Kino said during a news conference made available to media online.
Leeward areas of Oahu and Kauai, which saw some late-season showers in April, remain abnormally dry and susceptible to fire.
Looking ahead, Kino said conditions are expected to grow even more arid.
“We are expecting drier conditions to likely continue with drought conditions worsening across the entire state of Hawaii, ” he said.
Residents are urged to monitor weather forecasts for windy, dry days that elevate fire risk.
Kauai Fire Chief Michael Gibson said wildfires have already sparked on every major island this year—and the key to stopping them is speed.
“The best advantage that we have is to arrive early and arrive with more resources than are needed so we can stop the rapid growth of fire, ” Gibson said. “Instead of just sending the closest fire engine … we’ll send multiple resources so that if the first fire engine’s 750 gallons of water was not enough, we have another 750 coming, or 2, 000 gallons in the form of a water tender.”
Kauai is also expanding its firefighting capacity with a new twin-engine helicopter on the way, capable of dropping up to 400 gallons of water at a time—a five-fold increase over the island’s current aircraft. Six new brush trucks and four fire engines are in the pipeline, though Gibson acknowledged ongoing nationwide delays due to supply chain issues. Two of the fire engines were ordered four years ago and have yet to arrive, while two more are set to be ordered this year.
Beyond equipment, the department is urging residents to take responsibility for defensible space around their homes.
Kauai County’s website has “tips and guidance on how to maintain your property, to clear zones of hazardous fuel, vegetation, dried-out weeds or leaves that might be on your roof, ” according to Gibson.
But he also offered a sobering warning about the power of nature and its limits on emergency response.
“On a normal day, your fire department can put out almost any fire, ” Gibson said. “When that changes is when there’s high winds … once the winds reach speeds of 40 to 100 miles an hour, it is like a tsunami of fire.”
According to Michael Walker, state protection forester at the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, Hawaii’s fire suppression infrastructure has undergone a major overhaul since the deadly Lahaina fire on Aug. 8, 2023.
“Historically, the Division of Forestry and Wildlife was really underfunded, understaffed and underequipped to fulfill its mandate of suppressing fire on over a million acres of state lands, as well as working with our cooperators at the county and federal level, “ Walker said, noting that crews were often using 30-to 50-year-old hand-me-down equipment from California. “There were often many years with no fire suppression budget or not enough to cover the cost the division incurs.”
The state legislature has approved $10 million in funding for the DLNR DOFAW to purchase new fire equipment, including 17 brush engines, five off-road water tenders, bulldozers, helicopters and fuel-reduction tools. Lawmakers also allocated an additional $7.45 million in operational funds, part of which will support wildfire prevention measures such as hazardous fuel removal and community-based risk reduction programs.
Among those initiatives is the Firewise Communities program, which empowers neighbors to take collective action—something Elizabeth Pickett, co-executive director of the Hawaii Wildfire Management Organization, says is critical to building resilience.
“Fire only travels where there is fuel, and we can reduce the fuel, ” Pickett said. “We can get better prepared. We can have go bags. We can make and practice our evacuation routes and strategies. We can do our yard work. We can clear weeds from our roofs and our gutters.”
She urged residents to prepare ahead of time by doing yard work and removing combustible materials such as leaves, lumber, furniture or anything that could ignite from a wind-blown ember.
“We know that that first 5 feet around your home is the most powerful protection zone that you have, ” Pickett said. “We all can clear and maintain 5 feet … and that really could be the difference between your home surviving and not.”
This year’s campaign aims to keep those messages front and center as temperatures climb and grasses dry out across the islands. Officials emphasized that no amount of state or county preparation can substitute for personal and neighborhood-level action.
“This really is an everyone thing, ” Pickett said. “We have statewide awareness. We have a lot of concern, motivation, inspiration, readiness, commitment—but now we need to learn more, and we need to take action. We need to take it together.”