In the days immediately after wildfires ravaged portions of the Hawaiian island of Maui on August 8 and 9, in-state helitour operators swung into action, flying in tons of much-needed water, baby formula and diapers, feminine hygiene products, and pet food donated by volunteers and delivered via the island’s airports in Kahului (POGG) and Kapalua (PHJH), which remained open.
Rainbow Helicopters president Nicole Battjes, who has been working on the islands for 12 years, said the 70-mph sustained winds that fueled the Maui conflagration were the highest she had seen during her time in Hawaii and that they had shut down her operations on Oahu for two days. “That’s a pretty big deal for us," she said. "It was just insane.”
Rainbow’s involvement with the relief process started with a phone call for help from her Maui director of operations, Matthew Frisbie. It quickly became clear that thousands on Maui “had lost everything,” Battjes said. “We haven’t even really scratched the surface. It’s tragic.”
Battjes, who also serves as the current chair of Helicopter Association International and is the mother of two small children, including an eight-week-old, dispatched her father-in-law and an employee to the Honolulu Costco with a shopping list and her credit card. They returned $4,000 later.
“I was planning on just sort of paying for this stuff myself and just running it over there [to Maui]. But baby formula is $50 to $60 bucks a container and a box of diapers is like $45. I thought maybe we should start raising some funds.” Days later, the company’s GoFundMe page had raised more than $51,000 and Rainbow had delivered more than 3,000 pounds of supplies to Maui from its base at Honolulu International Airport (KHNL), flying its Robinson R44s and Airbus AStars.
Battjes credits all 50 of her employees for getting the job done. “Everyone has had their hands in this," she said. "People came in on their days off to launch helicopters. It’s just inspiring, really amazing.”
Rainbow is working with local assistance groups including Keiki O Ka ʻĀina, Na Aikane O Maui, and the Maui Aloha Diaper Bank. After a few intense days of supply runs, she dispatched employees to shelters on Maui to more precisely survey their needs and gear up for fresh sorties from Honolulu. All the supplies Rainbow flies in are taken to a makeshift distribution center in the Walgreens parking lot at the Lahaina Gateway.
Battjes said other tour operators flew into action to help as well. But there was nothing organized about it. It was “individual operators sort of taking their own initiative.”
One of those operators was Maverick Helicopters. Maverick’s chief pilot on Maui, Jake Harmon, knew the relief mission was on in earnest when supply-laden members of the public began showing up at the company’s hangar in Kahului after Maverick posted on its Instagram account that it would probably be flying some supply drops to the west side of the island.
Using four of its Airbus EC130s, Maverick delivered 18,000 pounds of supplies to the airport closest to fire-ravaged Lahaina, Kapalua. Harmon said the initial loads were around 1,000 pounds each and were a mix of bottled water and hygiene products as well as baby supplies. “All the stores burned down on that side of the island,” Harmon said.
But the airlift was short-lived. After a few days, Hawaii’s Department of Transportation shut down the airport there to civilian helicopter traffic. “They made an exception those first couple of days [after the main fires] but then they shut it down,” Harmon said. “We kind of thought it was a bummer that they did that, but now the roads are open and you can move a lot more supplies on the ground. But in the first few days, it was very helpful.”
Harmon said the ban is not a blanket one and that flights were still approved on a “case-by-case basis,” but that the “giant drops that we were doing the first couple of days [after the fires] were largely over” after four or five days. On the empty return flights, Maverick transported to Kahului at no charge approximately 30 individuals who needed to be evacuated from the island. “These were people who were either separated from their families or just wanted to get off the island. The roads were still closed.”
But things were far from smooth for those looking to evacuate out of Kahului. “There were several thousand people stacked up at the airport who couldn’t leave because they had no identification. All their stuff was at their hotels on the other side of the island and they weren’t allowed to go over there and get it. So we also brought a few people over there to retrieve their IDs and their stuff,” Harmon said.
While only about 25 percent of the island has been impacted by the fires, aside from the odd charter or a media flight, Maverick is not currently flying. However, the company’s owners have committed to keeping all 25 Maui employees on the payroll.
Still, Harmon is concerned. In mid-August, Maverick didn’t have any tours on the books. “This time of year, we are usually flying 15 tours a day. We’re at a complete standstill and so are the other operators. The governor and the mayor have asked people not to come to Maui. The hotels on the south side of the island and at Wailea, which would typically be very busy, are ghost towns. I was at a big one yesterday that only had 20 people in it. We need to fly to make sure we can pay everybody and right now there is just not anyone to fly.”
Coming on the heels of the recent Covid-induced travel slowdown, the fire could have a long-lasting impact on Maui tourism and, more importantly, the residents who rely on it, Harmon fears. “People aren’t working. It’s a big deal. Some of the hotels already are talking about layoffs.” While the destruction around Lahaina is tragic, Harmon emphasizes that “the rest of the island is the same. Everybody’s still just kind of at a loss for words for what happened, but once the dust settles and people can start to heal, the government needs to encourage people to come back to Maui. It’s still beautiful.”
In the days immediately after wildfires ravaged portions of the Hawaiian island of Maui on August 8 and 9, in-state helitour operators swung into action, flying in tons of much-needed water, baby formula and diapers, feminine hygiene products, and pet food donated by volunteers and delivered via the island’s airports in Kahului (POGG) and Kapalua (PHJH), which remained open.
Rainbow Helicopters president Nicole Battjes, who has been working on the islands for 12 years, said the 70-mph sustained winds that fueled the Maui conflagration were the highest she had seen during her time in Hawaii and that they had shut down her operations on Oahu for two days. “That’s a pretty big deal for us," she said. "It was just insane.”
Rainbow’s involvement with the relief process started with a phone call for help from her Maui director of operations, Matthew Frisbie. It quickly became clear that thousands on Maui “had lost everything,” Battjes said. “We haven’t even really scratched the surface. It’s tragic.”
Battjes, who also serves as the current chair of Helicopter Association International and is the mother of two small children, including an eight-week-old, dispatched her father-in-law and an employee to the Honolulu Costco with a shopping list and her credit card. They returned $4,000 later.
“I was planning on just sort of paying for this stuff myself and just running it over there [to Maui]. But baby formula is $50 to $60 bucks a container and a box of diapers is like $45. I thought maybe we should start raising some funds.” Days later, the company’s GoFundMe page had raised more than $51,000 and Rainbow had delivered more than 3,000 pounds of supplies to Maui from its base at Honolulu International Airport (KHNL), flying its Robinson R44s and Airbus AStars.
Battjes credits all 50 of her employees for getting the job done. “Everyone has had their hands in this," she said. "People came in on their days off to launch helicopters. It’s just inspiring, really amazing.”
Rainbow is working with local assistance groups including Keiki O Ka ʻĀina, Na Aikane O Maui, and the Maui Aloha Diaper Bank. After a few intense days of supply runs, she dispatched employees to shelters on Maui to more precisely survey their needs and gear up for fresh sorties from Honolulu. All the supplies Rainbow flies in are taken to a makeshift distribution center in the Walgreens parking lot at the Lahaina Gateway.
Battjes said other tour operators flew into action to help as well. But there was nothing organized about it. It was “individual operators sort of taking their own initiative.”
One of those operators was Maverick Helicopters. Maverick’s chief pilot on Maui, Jake Harmon, knew the relief mission was on in earnest when supply-laden members of the public began showing up at the company’s hangar in Kahului after Maverick posted on its Instagram account that it would probably be flying some supply drops to the west side of the island.
Using four of its Airbus EC130s, Maverick delivered 18,000 pounds of supplies to the airport closest to fire-ravaged Lahaina, Kapalua. Harmon said the initial loads were around 1,000 pounds each and were a mix of bottled water and hygiene products as well as baby supplies. “All the stores burned down on that side of the island,” Harmon said.
But the airlift was short-lived. After a few days, Hawaii’s Department of Transportation shut down the airport there to civilian helicopter traffic. “They made an exception those first couple of days [after the main fires] but then they shut it down,” Harmon said. “We kind of thought it was a bummer that they did that, but now the roads are open and you can move a lot more supplies on the ground. But in the first few days, it was very helpful.”
Harmon said the ban is not a blanket one and that flights were still approved on a “case-by-case basis,” but that the “giant drops that we were doing the first couple of days [after the fires] were largely over” after four or five days. On the empty return flights, Maverick transported to Kahului at no charge approximately 30 individuals who needed to be evacuated from the island. “These were people who were either separated from their families or just wanted to get off the island. The roads were still closed.”
But things were far from smooth for those looking to evacuate out of Kahului. “There were several thousand people stacked up at the airport who couldn’t leave because they had no identification. All their stuff was at their hotels on the other side of the island and they weren’t allowed to go over there and get it. So we also brought a few people over there to retrieve their IDs and their stuff,” Harmon said.
While only about 25 percent of the island has been impacted by the fires, aside from the odd charter or a media flight, Maverick is not currently flying. However, the company’s owners have committed to keeping all 25 Maui employees on the payroll.
Still, Harmon is concerned. In mid-August, Maverick didn’t have any tours on the books. “This time of year, we are usually flying 15 tours a day. We’re at a complete standstill and so are the other operators. The governor and the mayor have asked people not to come to Maui. The hotels on the south side of the island and at Wailea, which would typically be very busy, are ghost towns. I was at a big one yesterday that only had 20 people in it. We need to fly to make sure we can pay everybody and right now there is just not anyone to fly.”
Coming on the heels of the recent Covid-induced travel slowdown, the fire could have a long-lasting impact on Maui tourism and, more importantly, the residents who rely on it, Harmon fears. “People aren’t working. It’s a big deal. Some of the hotels already are talking about layoffs.” While the destruction around Lahaina is tragic, Harmon emphasizes that “the rest of the island is the same. Everybody’s still just kind of at a loss for words for what happened, but once the dust settles and people can start to heal, the government needs to encourage people to come back to Maui. It’s still beautiful.”