Former teacher, 93, among the deaths blamed on storm as Hawaii residents struggle to clean up

HONOLULU (AP) — A beloved former kindergarten teacher who taught generations of residents in a small town on Hawaii’s Big Island was among the two deaths authorities blamed on a hurricane that lashed the state over the weekend with heavy rain and strong winds.

May Doi, 93, was found dead Monday after she was reported missing, police said. Neighbors think she was escaping floodwaters in her home and trying to get to a nearby shelter, said ʻĀina Akamu, a former student of Doi’s who is now a vice principal at a local school.

She taught for so long at Naalehu Elementary on the island’s southern tip that “Mrs. Doi was my dad’s kindergarten teacher,” Akamu said Wednesday.

“She taught grandkids of her students,” he said. “She was a fixture in this community.”

Akamu often saw her taking walks around the small, rural, sugar plantation-era town: “She was so strong.”

He recalled how everyone looked forward to having Mrs. Doi as a teacher because she sometimes allowed students to have sleepovers in her classroom. Her deceased husband was a math teacher, Akamu said.

The body of a man in his 60s were located by residents in a pasture on Tuesday, a day after police were asked to conduct a welfare check, police said. Authorities hadn’t yet released his identity, the second death attributed to the storm.

Residents were struggling to clean up after Hurricane Lala tore roofs off houses, uprooted trees, covered roads in mud and rock and left ...