Lauren Sanchez, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s fiancée, announced on Friday that she and Bezo will establish a Maui relief fund to which they pledged $100 million.
Ms. Sanchez made the announcement as the death toll from the tragic wildfires continued to rise, climbing to 99 on Monday. An unknown number of people remain unaccounted for as firefighters continue extinguishing the flames.
“Jeff and I are creating a Maui Fund and are dedicating $100 million to help Maui get back on its feet now and over the coming years as the continuing needs reveal themselves.”
Ms. Sanchez and Mr. Bezos are part-time residents of Maui, owning a 14-acre estate on the south shore of the island.
“The immediate needs are important, and so it the longer term rebuilding that will have to happen—even after much of the attention has subsided,” Ms. Sanchez wrote.
Other famous billionaires owning land on Maui are Oprah Winfrey, Jimmy Buffett, Peter Thiel, and Nvidia co-founder Jensen Huang.
Oprah Winfrey Has Estate in Maui
On Thursday, a BBC crew ran into Oprah Winfrey—who owns more than 2,000 acres on Maui—while filming at the War Memorial Stadium in Maui, which has been turned into an evacuation center.“It’s a little overwhelming,” Ms. Winfrey, 69, told the BBC. “But I’m really so pleased to have so many people, you know, supporting, and people are just bringing what they can and doing what they can.”
“I came earlier, to see what people needed, and then went shopping,” the former talk show host added. “Because often, you know, you make donations of clothes or whatever, and it’s not really what people need, so I actually went to Walmart and Costco and got pillows, shampoo, diapers, sheets.”
Maui is Hawaii’s second-largest island. Weather experts believe that dry conditions and flammable non-native grasses, combined with strong winds from Hurricane Dora hundreds of miles southwest of Hawaii, spread the deadly blazes with astounding speed and intensity.
The disaster stands as the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than 100 years.