Searching for the missing on Maui, some wait in agony to make contact. And then the phone rings.

WAILUKU, Hawaii — Leshia Wright heard the crackle of the fast-moving inferno closing in on her residence in Lahaina and determined it was time to evacuate.

The 66-year-old grabbed her treatment for a pulmonary illness and her passport and fled the subdivision within the historic Hawaii oceanside group simply minutes earlier than flames engulfed the neighborhood. Hours later, she referred to as relations and informed them she slept in her automobile.

Then her cellphone went useless.

The subsequent 40 hours had been agony for her daughter in New York and sister in Arizona. However early Friday morning, Wright referred to as again and informed them she was OK.

“I’m clearly relieved past phrases that my mom is alive,” mentioned Alexandra Wright, who added that her mom lastly was in a position to cost her cellphone after reaching a buddy’s undamaged home on a quarter-tank of gasoline.

The firestorm that killed dozens of individuals and leveled this historic city launched a whole lot of individuals on a determined seek for their family members — many from hundreds of miles away — and a few are nonetheless looking out. However amid the tragedy, glimmers of pleasure and reduction broke by way of for the fortunate ones as their moms, brothers and fathers made it to security and eventually acquired in contact once more.

Kathleen Llewellyn additionally labored the telephones from hundreds of miles away in Bardstown, Kentucky, to seek out her 71-year-old brother, Jim Caslin, who had lived in Lahaina for 45 years. Her many calls went straight to voicemail.

“He’s homeless; he lives in a van; he’s acquired leukemia; he’s acquired mobility points and bronchial asthma and pulmonary points,” she mentioned.

Ready and calling and ready extra, Llewellyn grew uneasy. Anxiousness took maintain after which turned to resignation as Llewellyn, a semi-retired legal professional, tried to distract herself with work and weeding her backyard.

She recalled considering, “If that is his finish, that is his finish. I hope not. However there’s nothing I may do about it.”

Then her cellphone rang.

“I’m nice,” Caslin mentioned. “I’m nice.”

Caslin informed his sister he spent two days escaping the inferno with a buddy in a journey that included bumper-to-bumper visitors, street closures, downed timber and energy strains and a punctured tire. The pair nervously watched the gasoline needle drop earlier than a gasoline station appeared they usually pulled into the lengthy line.

“I’m a fairly managed individual, however I did have a very good cry,” Llewellyn mentioned.

Sherrie Esquivel was frantic to seek out her father, a retired mail service in Lahaina, however there was little she may do from her residence in Dunn, North Carolina.

She put her 74-year-old father’s identify on a lacking individual’s listing together with her cellphone quantity and waited.

“As the times had been occurring, I’m like, ‘There’s no approach that he survived as a result of … how have we not heard from him?’” she mentioned. “I felt so helpless.”

Early Friday morning, she acquired a name from her father’s neighbor, who had tracked Thom Leonard down. He was protected at a shelter, however misplaced every little thing within the hearth, the buddy informed her.

It wasn’t till Esquivel learn an Related Press article that she realized precisely how her father survived the fireplace. He was interviewed Thursday at a shelter on Maui.

Leonard tried however couldn’t depart Lahaina in his Jeep, so he scrambled to the ocean and hid behind the seawall for hours, dodging sizzling ash and cinders blowing in all places.

“After I heard that, I considered him when he was in Vietnam, and I assumed, ‘Oh, gosh, his PTSD should have kicked in and his survival instincts,’” she mentioned.

Firefighters ultimately escorted Leonard and others out of the burning metropolis.

Esquivel assumes it’s the identical seawall throughout the road from his residence the place they took household images at sundown in January.

She hoped to talk to her father, whom she described as a “hippie” who refuses to purchase a cellphone.

Once they speak, the primary phrases out of her mouth will likely be: “I like you, however I’m offended that you just didn’t get a cellphone,’” Esquivel mentioned.

Interviewed Friday on the similar shelter, Leonard additionally started to tear up when he heard what his daughter needed to inform him. “I’m quivering,” he mentioned, including he loves her too.

He mentioned he had a flip cellphone, however did not know tips on how to use it.

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Thiessen reported from Anchorage, Alaska, and Komenda from Tacoma, Washington.