Sue Brimeyer takes a break from searching the rubble of her Wainee Street home last month to describe her odyssey of survival during the Aug. 8 wildfire that decimated Lahaina. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos
With Lahaina exploding into flames all around them, Wainee Street resident Sue Brimeyer, 77, knew she had to keep her cool for the sake of her 11-year-old grandson.
“Being calm is probably the best way to survive things,” Brimeyer said this week from her new home in Kihei. “I was pretty calm. I just knew I was going to get him out of there.”
Her grandson, Kapono Ka’auwai, is autistic and nonverbal. She says he does not run, but can steadily cover ground once she gets him walking. And that’s what she did, time after time, as the two played a dangerous game of hide and seek with the wildfire that decimated Lahaina on Aug. 8.
Brimeyer, who is raising Kapono, said they were in their home across the street from Lahaina Hongwanji Mission when a neighbor, Benae Basurto, burst through the door and announced they had to evacuate. She and Basurto had been watching the smoke together earlier that afternoon and discounted the threat as a distant brushfire that would be contained.
“We didn’t think anything of it,” Brimeyer said. “Maybe 15 minutes later, she came rushing back over. She said, ‘We have to evacuate right now!’ I grabbed my purse and she already had my grandson by the hand and was taking him out to her SUV.”
Wading through ash and debris, Sue Brimeyer searches for keepsakes with granddaughter Keely Hassett on Nov. 27 The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos
Besurto said she and other neighbors had been alerted by drivers escaping on Wainee Street.
“They said, ‘Get out, the fire is coming,’ “ Besurto recalled Thursday.
Besurto said she was preparing to caravan out with another neighbor when she remembered Brimeyer.
“I said, ‘Wait, what about Sue? We’ve got to get Sue.’ I think she was unaware of the severity. I think she would have stayed in her house if I didn’t take her.”
Brimeyer and Kapono piled into Besurto’s SUV along with Besurto’s teenaged daughter, their dog and another friend. In hindsight, Brimeyer admits that is where they should have stayed, but the sudden stimulation was upsetting to Kapono and he began “freaking out.” Brimeyer also realized she had forgotten to grab any of his diapers, so she asked Besurto to drop her off at grandson Palani Hassett’s house on nearby Alio Street.
Sue Brimeyer poses for a photo with grandson, Kapono Ka‘auwai, Thursday afternoon in Kihei. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos
“She didn’t want to,” Brimeyer said. “She kept asking, ‘Are you sure? Are you sure?’ It was so windy and confusing, but I still thought we would be OK.”
The fact that Hassett was off-island did not dissuade her. Nor that there was no phone service, electricity or water pressure. She and Kapono spent time with worried neighbors out in the street and walked to the beach to get a better view of the towering black cloud belching from the center of town. They returned from the beach and “hung out” in the Alio Street home until she looked out a window and spotted embers falling from the sky. Opening the door, she saw a neighbor’s house was on fire and another across the street was being peppered by embers and about to ignite.
“I was expecting firefighters to come, but they were busy elsewhere,” Brimeyer said. “I said, ‘We have to get out of here.’ “
Using water from a pitcher in the refrigerator, she wet a towel and T-shirt to put over their heads.
“We went outside and I could see the fire and smoke was coming down the street. The wind and the explosions were constant.”
Sue Brimeyer inspects a ceramic Christmas tree that was painted by her mother. The tree was recovered last month from the ruins of Brimeyer’s Wainee Street home. Also atop the wall fronting the property are pieces of pottery made by her father and parts of antique ceramic dolls. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos
Getting Kapono moving, she led him to a neighbor’s house to shelter, and then another and another when the smoke became too thick.
“He didn’t know what was going on, but he didn’t like the explosions,” Brimeyer said. “He kept trying to open the doors of the houses to go inside. I said, ‘No, nobody’s home.’ “
The third house had an L-shaped lanai area that screened them from the brunt of the smoke and embers as Hassett’s home and most others around them burned. A tree caught fire next door and she tried to put it out with a garden hose, but still there was no water pressure. The howling winds that had been steadily quartering from Olowalu began to shift toward the ocean.
“I went back to sit with my grandson and thought, ‘This is when we should be leaving.’ I wasn’t really scared. It was strange, I knew I had to get my grandson out of there. I just couldn’t find anybody. I guess everybody evacuated.”
She put the wet towel over Kapono’s head, grabbed her purse and a small battery-powered lantern she brought from Hassett’s house, and headed for home. The voice of her late husband, Gary Brimeyer, ran through her mind as they left the steadily advancing fire behind and escaped the burning neighborhood.
Ceramic doll heads and a torso are three of the more than charred 100 items recovered from the ashes of Brimeyer’s Lahaina home. The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER photos
“My husband just passed away last year and I could just hear him saying, ‘Susie, what are you thinking?’
“Kapono doesn’t run, so I had to walk with him to Wainee Street. I wasn’t dragging him, I just told him to walk fast.”
Crossing Shaw Street on Wainee, she saw that both Waiola Church and Lahaina Hongwanji had burned to the ground. Her house and nearly all of her neighbors’ homes were also leveled. Still standing, however, were the Hongwanji’s tall, steep-roofed columbarium and the obon tower that had been stationed in the temple’s manicured yard for an upcoming obon dance. Brimeyer spread the towel under the tower for Kapono and he went right to sleep, using her purse for a pillow.
Once he was out, she decided to check her daughter’s home located close by on Wainee Street. She didn’t get far before discovering a body in the street.
“He was lying on the ground with his arms outstretched,” she said. “He was gone. There was nothing I could do for him.”
Shaken, she confirmed her daughter’s place was destroyed, then returned to spend the rest of the night sitting beside Kapono. Puamana burned in the distance, but most of the smoke had cleared in their part of town.
“It was real quiet. I could hear the ocean because everything between us and the ocean had burned. I had never heard the ocean from my house before.”
Like the columbarium, a smattering of other Lahaina structures survived the fires. Seemingly without rhyme or reason, often surrounded by utter destruction, these homes and businesses emerged unscathed. All three houses where Brimeyer and Kapono sheltered after leaving Hassett’s doomed home still stand.
The next morning, she and Kapono began walking in search of help. They found it with a county worker named Tyler who made a U-turn on Shaw Street and picked them up in his truck.
“He said, ‘Aunty, you need some help?’ “
Tyler ended up driving them to Maalaea after making arrangements via satellite phone with Brimeyer’s son to meet them at the Maui Ocean Center. He even had snacks to share with Kapono.
“My family was beside themselves,” Brimeyer said. “They were freaking out because they couldn’t get in touch with me. They were very worried.”
Brimeyer returned to the charred ruins of her home on Nov. 27, the first day her zone was open to residents. She says with the help of family members, she has been able to recover more than 100 items, including pottery made by her father and a ceramic Christmas tree painted by her mother. She credits cement floors covered by Spanish tile for making the job easier than it has been for many homeowners sifting through the rubble.
“I was amazed at all the pottery I found, and the jewelry. I didn’t find my wedding ring, but I did find my class ring and my mother’s class ring and her watch.”
Much like those unscathed homes they sheltered beside, she says she and Kapono emerged with their health intact.
“I took Pono to the doctor three days later and he was fine. I didn’t feel any ill effects. He doesn’t remember. It hasn’t affected his sleep.”
She says they had to move four times in the aftermath, but have since settled into a Kihei home purchased with insurance money. Husband Gary spent his career in the insurance industry and he made sure their home was covered for a catastrophe like this.
As with countless mothers and grandmothers, whether they be mama Grizzly bears or a 77-year-old Lahaina woman, Brimeyer fearlessly protected her family member without regard for her own safety. Her coolness under pressure continues to this day as she shrugs off the harrowing challenges she faced.
“I never thought I was going to die. I knew I was in danger, but I knew I had to get Pono out of there. I didn’t panic. I just waited until there was a break in the wind. The only thing that bothered my grandson were the explosions. They were so loud and constant.”
Brimeyer says she plans to return to Lahaina to live as soon as she can.
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