Two Maui Heroes Looking to Get Back on the Water

In the aftermath of the fire that swept through Maui’s coastal town of Lahaina, many boat owners are trying to rebuild, including those whose vessels once served the local communities. This story from Victoria Moore focuses on two women who lost all their working vessels and are struggling to find just one replacement.

Every boat owner has experienced that unsettling moment when something inside them says, “I better go check the lines.” Emma Nelson of Maui had an uneasy feeling on the morning of August 8, when the winds were picking up due to Hurricane Dora far offshore. She wanted extra assurance that all the lines were secured well enough on their newly renovated boat to withstand the big winds.

”We were already getting 70 mph gusts at 6 a.m., and we got some extra lines on the boat. After about an hour we felt like we had done what we could to keep the boat secure.” But as the day progressed, that uneasy feeling persisted. “We should just go check one more time,” she told her wife and fellow boat captain, Chrissy Lovitt. As they approached the harbor around 3 p.m, the lines were still attached, but they could tell Lahaina’s situation was rapidly deteriorating. “At that point we could see Lahaina literally coming apart. Garage doors were blown in, roofs were being ripped off, and then suddenly this black cloud of smoke was billowing down the mountain.”

The two women jumped into action. What followed was one of the most harrowing and heroic accounts I’ve heard of in the wake of the Maui wildfires. Since their own boat couldn’t be backed out of the slip against the strong winds, Chrissy, Emma, and fellow boat captain Lashawna Garnier jumped into a small skiff and started helping stranded boat owners get to safety. Fire started to engulf Front Street and was approaching the harbor, and Chrissy and Emma could barely see through the thick smoke. “The smoke and debris were completely blinding us,” Chrissy said. “It was like driving at night with no sunlight penetrating the smoke. I basically had to drive on memory since I’ve navigated that harbor for almost three decades.”

For hours, Chrissy, Emma, and Lashawna persisted in the rough water, toxic air, and blinding conditions looking for survivors who had fled into the water to escape the fires. Among the many people they saved that night, the women helped two small kids out of the ocean and got them to a Coast Guard ship waiting in deeper waters. They watched in disbelief as their own beloved 36-ft power catamaran, Wahine Koa (“Strong Woman” in Hawaiian), went up in flames along with nearly every other boat in the harbor.

Wahine Koa had only been in the water for two weeks after Emma and Chrissy worked tirelessly to get her just right after purchasing her. “To put every ounce of your energy, all of your finances, and all of your hopes and dreams into this boat that barely even got a chance to operate just crushes you,” Emma said. The couple also lost their two other boats that were trailered at the Pioneer Mill in the heart of Lahaina. “We’re really just left with nothing. Our entire livelihood burned.”

Many people whose boats burned in the Lahaina harbor are currently dealing with the accompanying sadness, loss of livelihood, and endless insurance claims. But Emma and Chrissy also feel as if they’re letting down the community they served. They were using Wahine Koa as part of their newly formed social enterprise called InstaBoat, helping to bring supplies and food to the neighboring island of Lanai at a significant discount to help support the community. “It’s not just that we’ve lost jobs, it feels like we’ve lost our ability to give to a community that we care about and that has supported us so much,” Emma said. InstaBoat is now on hold indefinitely until they’re able to relaunch.

Replacing all the boats that were lost in Maui is proving to be an incredible challenge. Unlike the mainland, where boat brokers are easy to find and extensive inventory exists up and down the West Coast, Emma and Chrissy are finding that local options on neighboring islands are next to nil. “We spend hours every day just trying to find boats to go look at. We’ve flown to other islands and just keep coming up short of something that will meet our needs,” Emma said. Since only two of their three boats were insured, and neither at the full replacement value, Emma and Chrissy are having to downsize to only one boat, ideally, a 35-ft powerboat that can haul supplies and possibly run charters to subsidize their delivery prices to Lanai.

“When something like this happens your priorities really shift,” Emma added. “If this experience has taught me anything it’s that community is really what matters the most, and we can’t wait to get back on the water and do our part in helping the community again.”

Emma and Chrissy are searching high and low for a boat with which they can resume their service to Lanai. If anyone knows of a boat, or has any leads, please let us know.

* We shared Lashawna Garnier’s account of her experience in the Lahaina fire in Latitude 38’s November issue.