News Wrap: Hawaii governor surveys Maui fire damage, warns death toll will grow

John Yang:

Good evening, I'm John Yang. The death toll from the Maui wildfire keeps climbing it now stands at 93. That's the most people killed by any U.S. wildfire in more than a century. Hawaii Governor Josh Green surveyed the damage with FEMA head Deanne Criswell, the governor warned that the number of dead will grow. He said the search for bodies will take time.

Gov. Josh Green (D) Hawaii: We have to go with caution. There are heavy metals there. There are toxic states where the houses have come down. Businesses have come down. The recommendations are to avoid those structures because they can still fall on people. And we've lost too much life already.

John Yang:

The Maui chief of police said that so far, only 3 percent of the burned area has been searched. He said the pace should pick up as more help arrives. Amid the search for the dead there are tales of survival and trauma. One family escaped the flames by jumping into the ocean and staying there for five hours. And survivors told of their ordeals the pain of not being able to save others was evident.

David, Lahaina Resident:

I saw from friend get on the ground like a piece of charcoal like an Pompeii almost is dead. I mean, there's nothing you can do. It was that fast.

John Yang:

To help the some 4,500 people who need shelter, officials said that so far they've secured 500 hotel rooms.

In China it's heavy rains that are causing problems. In western China mudslide and flash flood left at least 21 people dead. Chinese officials said a highway was damaged and power was knocked out. Searchers were looking for six people reported missing.

In Ukraine, Russian shelling killed seven people today in the southern region of Kherson. Ukraine's Internal Affairs Ministry reported that among the dead were four members of one family, a newborn, her parents and her 12-year-old brother.

And in the Black Sea, a Russian warship fired warning shots at a cargo ship. It's the first time Russia has fired on a merchant vessel since pulling out of a deal that allowed Ukraine to export grain shipments through the Black Sea.

And last night was peak viewing all over the world for the annual Perseid meteor shower. The moon was just a slim Crescent so in places without much light pollution or cloud cover, meteors could be seen streaking across the sky at a rate of one a minute. It's not too late to catch the celestial show. There will be some stragglers tonight and early this week.

Still to come on PBS News Weekend. a rural community is forced to adjust when the main customer for its farmers crop shuts down, and the court battle over the approval of the nation's first publicly funded religious school.