Five more people have been identified, but their names have not yet been released because the authorities have not been able to notify their families. The last time the death toll changed was on Aug. 21, the day that President Biden visited Lahaina, a span of time that reflects the new phase of the recovery effort, as well as the likelihood that many people’s bodies were reduced to unrecoverable ash. The actual death toll is unlikely to be determined for weeks or months. He said that ANDE’s technicians have left Maui, and that determining the final death toll would now largely rely on slow-paced detective work — for instance, interviewing the family and friends of those missing to determine if they were in Lahaina that day and where. The authorities will have to determine whether their investigative results are sufficient to declare those still missing as dead.

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Persons: Biden, Stephen Meer, — Locations: Lahaina, California, Colorado, Maui