Spectrum, Hawaiian Telcom Were Liable for Lahaina Wildfire, Says Class Action

Spectrum removed to U.S. District Court for Hawaii Tuesday a second amended negligence class action filed Oct. 13 in Hawaii’s 1st Circuit Court in which 38 plaintiffs seek to hold Spectrum and Hawaiian Telcom, among dozens of named landowner, municipality and utility defendants, at least partially liable for causing the Aug. 8 Lahaina wildfire that killed more than 100 and destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses.

Spectrum doesn’t "concede" that any member of the putative class “has a viable claim under any theory of liability or that any class treatment is appropriate,” said its notice of removal (docket 1:23-cv-00459). Spectrum also denies that the plaintiffs or any putative class members “are entitled to recover any amount” in damages, it said. The plaintiffs compare their putative classes with those in the collapse of the Champlain Towers condominium building in Florida in 2021, which resulted in nearly $1.2 billion in settlement funds, said the notice.

The complaint alleges four electric utilities “inexcusably kept their power lines energized during forecasted high fire danger conditions,” including high wind and red flag warning from the National Weather Service. The utilities also failed “to replace their old wooden power poles,” it said. The poles “have exceeded their useful life, sit dangerously vulnerable and in poor condition, and fail to meet the National Electric Safety Code requirement to withstand wind speeds of 105 miles per hour,” it said.

The alleged liability of Spectrum and Hawaiian Telcom comes into play for the “avoidable failures” that “contributed to this preventable tragedy,” alleged the complaint. They own and operate telecommunications equipment attached to the wooden power poles on Maui, under licenses from the local utilities, it said. Despite their duty to properly design, construct, install, use, inspect, repair and maintain that equipment, Spectrum and Hawaiian Telcom “overloaded at least some of the power poles, destabilizing them” in the high winds, it said.

The wooden poles snapped, broke and otherwise failed during the Aug. 8 high-wind event, said the complaint. Some of those pole failures “caused and contributed to the ignition of multiple wildfires on Maui,” including the Lahaina wildfire, it said.

The origin point of the Lahaina wildfire, Pole Number 7A, “was overloaded with power and telecommunications equipment” long before Aug. 8, said the complaint. Google’s Street View photography in October 2019 depicted Pole Number 7A bearing telecommunications equipment that was “improperly and unsafely installed, tensioned, and maintained,” it said.

The overloaded equipment caused the wooden pole depicted in the 2019 photo to lean in “a continuous, downhill pull,” said the complaint. Pole Number 7A snapped and fell on Aug. 8, “initiating this tragedy,” it said.

Spectrum and Hawaiian Telcom overloaded the wooden power poles “by tensioning their telecommunications cables attached to one side of these poles too tightly,” said the complaint. That caused the poles “to lean from a straight and upright position,” it said. That tension on the poles and their subsequent leaning “subjected the poles to more shear force from high winds than the poles would have experienced if they had remained in a straight and upright position,” it said.