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A group of scientists raced into the ocean off Lahaina on Wednesday morning to quickly gather samples from a massive brown plume that surrounded the fire-scorched West Maui town. Wearing waders, gloves and respirators, they filled buckets and test tubes with murky liquid that will help yield clues about what’s in the water.

Things looked a bit unsettling.

“We were seeing really high turbidity numbers like I’ve never seen in the field before,” said Liz Yannell, program manager with , a group of nonprofits that does ocean health work. “Incredibly high.”

Yannell is part of a multi-agency effort investigating how toxic runoff from some 2,170 acres of burned land and more than 2,200 destroyed buildings may be leaching into Lahaina’s coastal waters and coral reef ecosystem.

Collecting Samples

Although Yannell and others have been collecting samples and analyzing data from ocean sensors for months, several scientists said they felt a sense of urgency to gather ocean data quickly this week after about four inches of rain fell on Lahaina between Monday and Wednesday morning.

The precipitation undoubtedly washed some amount of fire residue into the ocean either directly from the surface or from underground sources, including lava tubes, according to experts.

The sheer size of the sediment plume in the ocean was “pretty striking,” said Sean Swift, a graduate student at the University of Hawaii who is working on a National Science Foundation-funded study of the wildfire’s impact on the marine environment.  

“What you can infer is that there’s a lot of organic material that has made its way into the ocean,” Swift said.

Although sampling results won’t be in for some time, there’s no question that water quality and marine life are being impacted.

“From a basic hydrology standpoint, there’s definitely sediment impacts to the reef,” said Christopher Shuler, a hydrologist with the University of Hawaii Manoa’s

The health of coral reefs and nearshore ecosystems is an indicator of overall community health, experts say, especially in an island chain like Hawaii where residents often have deep cultural, personal and economic ties to the ocean.

Soil Stabilizer

Although the Environmental Protection Agency has applied a soil stabilizer to scorched properties in Lahaina and Maui County has placed absorbent material and other pollution controls around storm drains and along Front Street, it’s highly likely that some level of contaminants found in the ash – things like arsenic, lead and volatile organic compounds – entered the ocean.

“Without question, some of that is making its way into the coastal waters,” Shuler said. “At this point we really don’t know the impacts.”

Flooding from this week’s winter storm impacted Kihei the hardest, but Lahaina, one of the hottest and driest parts of Maui, was not spared.

In addition to the four inches of rainfall, some parts of Lahaina saw pools of six to eight inches of standing water, according to Honolulu-based National Weather Service meteorologist Derek Wroe.

He described the storm as “a pretty good rain event” and said more rain is in the forecast for Thursday evening.

Shuler, Swift and Yannell are among a cadre of experts from UH Manoa, the U.S. Geological Survey, Hawaii Departments of Health and Land and Natural Resources, Hui O Ka Wai Ola, Pacific Whale Foundation and others that are collaborating to assess the effects of the deadly Aug. 8 wildfire.

While the fire destroyed so much, it is proving to be something of a boon for science.

The National Science Foundation is pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into research studies on how the fire has affected the ocean and the land around Lahaina.

Andrea Kealoha, a faculty member with the University of Hawaii School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology is among those who received an NSF “rapid response” grant to study water quality and reef impacts from the fire. The goal is to learn how resilient or not the ecosystem proves to be from the stressors imposed by fire contaminants.  

Kealoha is leading a team that is identifying pollutants such as copper, lead and organic contaminants common in burned wood and plastics.

Over the next year, the scientists will document how the coral reef off Lahaina is faring and the level of contaminants it encounters.

one of the collaborators, is focusing on the potential accumulation of contaminants in reef fish. 

The is working on an analysis of wildfire, urban, household and agricultural contaminants at various shoreline and reef sites in Lahaina to understand not only what’s there, but how the contaminants enter the ocean.

Identifying the “transport pathways” will be key to helping county, state and federal officials understand the entry points of the pollution so they can respond and try to mitigate risks to public health and safety, said USGS research geologist .

California-based Takesue is traveling to Maui regularly to take samples of the mud and sand off the sea floor, among other areas. She’s looking at the long-term potential impacts.

“Unquestionably, some of that will be toxic,” she said. “The real question is how long will it hang around?”

Civil Beat’s coverage of Maui County is supported in part by grants from the Nuestro Futuro Foundation.

Civil Beat’s community health coverage is supported by the Swayne Family Fund of Hawaii Community Foundation, the Cooke Foundation, and Papa Ola Lokahi.