fires Archives - Dr. Rich Swier

A devastating wildfire that ripped through the town of Lahaina on the island of Maui in Hawaii last week has left 96 people dead so far, with the number of fatalities likely to climb significantly higher in the coming weeks. A local pastor is urging believers to pray for the specific needs of the local community.

As details slowly emerge following the destruction of all of the cell towers in the Lahaina area, the extent of the damage was difficult for observers to comprehend, with virtually every building in the town of 13,000 burned to the ground and an estimated loss of $5.6 billion. The cause of the wildfires are still under investigation, which were fueled by dry summer conditions and strong winds from a nearby hurricane, causing the fire to spread at speeds of up to one mile per minute. As the town became inundated by the wildfire, local officials failed to activate warning sirens and instead used social media posts. The disaster is already the deadliest wildfire in over a century.

“The descriptions that we are being given is nothing short of Hiroshima,” Pastor Waxer Tipton, of One Love Ministries in Hawaii, explained on the August 11 edition of “Washington Watch.” “… [T]he guesstimate right now for those that are on the ground is [there could eventually be up to] 800 [fatalities or] more. … So it is devastation beyond compare.”

Tipton went on to describe just how harrowing it was for survivors, many of whom were forced to flee from the approaching wildfire on foot into the ocean to escape the flames due to traffic gridlock.

“[I]t’s definitely the time right now [for] the church to mobilize,” he emphasized. “As soon as we heard about it, we started to make our church a sanctuary so that families and all the tourists, we have 4,000 tourists there, [so] there’s not even enough food and supplies for all of the locals there. … And so families are able to come there and have some place to stay in the meantime. And so what’s happening here is the churches are rallying together with food and water and supplies and especially fuel … But the main situation, the main need … is going to be resources and getting those resources to the churches, to the pastors, because even if you’re in the shelter and you ran for your life, you don’t even have a blanket, much less an air mattress of some kind. Many of them don’t even have their IDs because it happened so fast.”

Ministries such as Samaritan’s Purse are also responding to the disaster. Edward Graham, chief operating officer at Samaritan’s Purse, recently described on “Washington Watch” how his organization would be deploying volunteers to help those who lost their homes to sift through the remains. “This is where we go through and we look for materials or for artifacts. Maybe it’s a trinket, maybe it’s a ring, something that’s important to that homeowner. It helps them bring closure during a time like this. … [S]o we expect to go there and work through the local church and help with sifting once this this fire is over.”

“We should be praying,” Graham continued. “I’m a firm believer in the power of prayer.”

Pastor Tipton concurred, pointing out the need for prayer for the specific needs of those affected by the ongoing Hawaiian wildfires, which continue to burn.

“Pray for calm,” he underscored. “People are in a state of panic and fear which is creating some hostile situations at the moment. Secondly, pray for rain. This is a dry side of the island, and we don’t really see any in the forecast, and it is much needed. Third, pray for power and cell towers to be expediently returned so that help can begin. And fourth, pray for all the agencies seeking to gather together can coordinate and work together alongside the churches to bring much-needed aid.”

AUTHOR

Dan Hart

Dan Hart is senior editor at The Washington Stand.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

The below was posted on the White House website a few days ago; it has since been replaced by a video, narrated by Dr. John Holdren, Mr. Obama’s Science Advisor. It purports to explain why wildfires are increasing – it’s because of climate change/global warming/carbon pollution, of course.

For a larger view click on the image.

I live on five acres in Colorado, with lots of Ponderosa pines, many more than 100 years old and more than 100 feet high. I also live about 40 miles from the Black Forest, north of Colorado Springs, where a fire in 2013 burned 511 homes, killed 2 people, and charred 14,000 acres of trees. I’m about 60 miles from the Waldo Canyon fire of 2012, which burned 346 homes and scorched 15,364 acres – much of that in suburban Colorado Springs. Those are only two of several fires Colorado had in the last two years. A fire is horrible and terrifying, a nightmare of trying to get your family, your animals, and your most precious keepsakes out of the path of hell on Earth. The aftermath of rebuilding and living for years in a moonscape of blackened earth is worse.

I spend a lot of my Summer time trimming trees, thinning trees, and taking slash to the dump. I take wildfires and wildfire prevention pretty seriously; so does my insurance company.

Nothing – not a damned thing – in the White House claim is true. There hasn’t been any global warming for nearly 18 years, though atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) has continued to increase. The climate models, for which the taxpayer has paid billions of dollars, have been consistently wrong in predicting warming. Both Arctic and Antarctic ice cover are at or far above normal levels. And the USA has been both cooler and wetter this year.

Accordingly, I really can’t express, as a scientist and citizen, how much I despise Barack Obama, John Holdren, John Podesta and their White House accomplices for these lies about something so frightening and heart-wrenching to so many people. Wildfires thus far (August 1, 2014) have dramatically declined over the last decade.

Data courtesy of the National Interagency Fire Center. For a larger view click on the graph.

The data is from a Federal agency, the National Interagency Fire Center; hat tip to Steven Goddard for the plot. They also tabulate the number of wildfires; that number is down dramatically also. Obama and his fellow global warming travelers just lie continuously about climate change, just as they did about Obamacare. Their supporters in the major media continue to support and perpetuate the lie despite the science.

MORON OF THE WEEK:

Fresh from his diplomatic triumphs in the Middle East, Secretary of State John Kerry is back in Washington, D.C. to harangue the leaders of Africa (“the nation of Africa”, as Biden said) about climate change. Nearly 30 percent of the world’s 842 million hungry live on the continent, and John Kerry wants to………feed them? Nope!

Acknowledging the reality of child hunger in Africa, Mr. Kerry urged leaders not to undertake an enormous campaign to feed those whose every day is a struggle to stay alive, but to introduce inefficient farming that responds to the “impact of climate change.”

Yes, Kerry really told these Africans to let their children continue to starve.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Global Warming Pause Puts ‘Crisis’ In Perspective – Forbes
NASA Climate Scientist Explains 15-Year ‘Global Warming Hiatus’ « CBS DC
Can ants save Earth from global warming? – The Times of India

Tag Archive for: fires

Pastor Urges Prayer for Devastated Hawaiian Town

Dan Hart

A Forest Fire of Lies from President Obama

MORON OF THE WEEK: