Hui O Ka Wai Ola, a community-based water quality monitoring organization on Maui, was awarded FEMA funding to increase the work it was already doing off the coastal areas of Lahaina before the August wildfire.
The organization was one of the first groups to test water quality in the burn zone.
“We've been doing water quality sampling and testing on the Leeward coast since 2016," said Liz Yannell, program manager at Hui O Ka Wai Ola.
"We had four sites in Lahaina prior to the fires, but there's more concern now and there were other areas of interest in the burn zone for us. So we added in three more sites right in the burn zone and now we have a total of seven."
The collected samples from the sites in Lahaina are tested for the presence of heavy metals, volatile organic compounds and semi-volatile organic compounds.
Yannell said so far, results haven’t indicated there are huge changes after the fire, but they are still awaiting some of the test results to come back.
They will also test after heavy rains in Lahaina to check on the health of the reef with possible runoff.
"We have a lot to learn and that’s part of why it's so important we just keep going out with the regularity so that we can see if things change if things are shifting," Yannell said.
"We just have big concerns about how our coral reefs will be doing out there and how much that affects the entire ecosystem and all of our islands in so many ways. It's all so connected.”
