Hawaii's chief legal officer said Friday she was opening a probe into the handling of devastating wildfires that killed at least 80 people in the state this week, as criticism grows of the official response.

The announcement came as residents of Lahaina were allowed back into the town for the first time -- with most finding their homes had been reduced to ashes, and even the lucky few angry at a sense of abandonment.

"Everything has been coconut wire," said William Harry, refering to a system of rumours.

"One person heard, then told another, but it's not official information. They don't come here and explain anything."

Another man, who did not want to be named, told AFP he felt like he had been left to fend for himself.

"Where is the government? Where are they?" he fumed.

"This is insane. We can't move freely, we don't get the support, now we've heard about looting."

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Hawaii's Attorney General Anne Lopez said her office would be examining "critical decision-making and standing policies leading up to, during and after the wildfires on Maui and Hawai'i islands this week."

"My department is committed to understanding the decisions that were made before and during the wildfires and to sharing with the public the results of this review."

- Reunion -

For some of those who made it back into Lahaina, there was elation as they tearfully reconnected with neighbors they feared might not have got out alive.

"You made it!" cried Chyna Cho, as she embraced Amber Langdon amid the ruins. "I was trying to find you."

For some of the luckiest, there was joy -- albeit tempered by the scale of the tragedy that counts among the worst natural disasters to hit the state of Hawaii.

"I just couldn't believe it," Keith Todd told AFP after finding his home intact.

"I'm so grateful, but at the same time it's so devastating."

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Todd, 64, discovered his house and his neighbor's house untouched, and his solar panels providing electricity to the fridge, which was still dispensing ice on demand.

But even those few whose homes still appeared habitable were being warned they might not be safe.

"Some structures in the Lahaina water system were destroyed by the fire... These conditions may have caused harmful contaminants, including benzene and other volatile organic chemicals (VOCs), to enter the water system," said Maui's water department.

"As a precaution...(we) are advising residents to not use the tap water for drinking and cooking until further notice."

- 'It hurts' -

Some of those who made it back to Lahaina wandered in stunned silence trying to take in the enormity of the destruction.

Anthony La Puente said the shock of finding his home burned to nothing was profound.

"It sucks not being able to find the things you grew up with, or the things you remember," he told AFP of the house he had lived in for 16 years.

"The only thing I can say is that it hurts. It takes a toll on you emotionally," the 44-year-old said.

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La Puente dug through the still warm ashes of his home, picking out a Starbucks tumbler that had survived, but despairing at the loss of irreplaceable things, like mementoes of his late father.

"I had packed up my dad's belongings" hoping to sort through them at some point, he said.

But that will never happen.

"Now it's gone."

- Cadaver dogs -

The confirmed toll rose to 80 on Friday, surpassing the number of people killed when a tsunami struck the Big Island in 1960.

The death toll from wildfires that destroyed swathes of Hawaii this week has risen to 80, Maui county officials said Friday.

"The number of fatalities is at 80," the county said in a regular update, adding that 1,418 people were at emergency evacuation shelters.

"Without a doubt, there will be more fatalities. We don't know ultimately how many will have occurred," Governor Josh Green said.

Crews from Honolulu arrived on Maui along with search and rescue teams equipped with K-9 cadaver dogs, Maui County said.

Firefighters were continuing to extinguish flare-ups and contain wildfires in Lahaina, with spot blazes evident to the AFP team in the town.

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Maui County Police Chief John Pelletier said Thursday that as many as 1,000 people could be unaccounted for, though he stressed that this did not mean they were missing or dead.

Communications in the western part of the island remain tricky, and Pelletier said many of those whose whereabouts were not known could simply be out of reach.

The fires follow other extreme weather events in North America this summer, with record-breaking wildfires still burning across Canada and a major heat wave baking the US southwest.

Europe and parts of Asia have also endured soaring temperatures, with major fires and floods wreaking havoc.

Stunned residents find nothing but ashes

When Anthony La Puente made it back to the place he had called home for the last 16 years, there was almost nothing left.

His house, like most in Lahaina, had been razed by the wildfire that swept through this slice of Hawaiian paradise.

"The only thing I can say is that it hurts. It takes a toll on you emotionally," the 44-year old said.

"It sucks not being able to find the things you grew up with, or the things you remember."

La Puente was one of dozens of people who were allowed back into what used to be Lahaina on Friday.

The 12,000-strong town, which has stood on the island of Maui for hundreds of years, was once the proud home of the Hawaiian royal family.

Thousands of tourists visit every year to soak up the atmosphere, to wander along the scenic harbor front, and to idle under a majestic banyan tree reputed to be the oldest in the United States.

- 'You made it!' -

An AFP team that walked through the town on Friday found the blackened corpses of cats, birds and other animals caught in flames that also killed at least 67 people.

Electricity cables dangled uselessly from stricken poles, and small pockets of fire continued to burn.

Spray-painted Xs marked the skeletal vehicles that lay in the street -- a sign to firefighters they have been checked for victims.

All through the town, there were piles of still-warm ashes where family homes once stood.

Using the metal frame of a chair as a makeshift shovel, La Puente sifted through what was once his kitchen, uncovering a Starbucks tumbler.

But the boxes of photographs and the mementoes from his 16 years in the house were gone -- including the treasured items of his late father.

"I had packed up my dad's belongings" hoping to sort through them at some point, he said.

But that will never happen.

"Now it's gone."

Elsewhere there was shocked elation as neighbors hugged.

"You made it!" cried Chyna Cho, as she embraced Amber Langdon amid the ruins. "I was trying to find you."

For Keith Todd there was the unspeakable relief of finding his home still standing, his solar panels still pumping electricity to his kitchen.

"I just couldn't believe it," Todd told AFP.

"I'm so grateful, but at the same time it's so devastating," he said, looking around at the unrecognizable piles that were once his neighbors' homes.

Todd was resolved to stay at his house, fearful of the looters that people say have been targeting empty properties.

"I will stay here, now that I know my house and my things are here. I will sleep here just in case someone tries to come in," he said.

- Banyan tree -

Here and there in the warscape were pockets of improbable hope.

The Maria Lanakila Catholic Church was seemingly unscathed, looming over the ashes of Waine'e Street, a small fire burning in front of it like some kind of perverse Eternal Flame.

The stone walls of the historic Hale Pa'ahao prison still stood, but the wooden building that was used to punish unruly sailors was no more -- 170 years of history wiped out.

Blocks away, Front Street, where restaurants had jostled with clothing stores for a view of the ocean, was all but gone.

Boats that had been moored in the harbor days earlier were blackened, melted or sunk.

Among the ruins, the huge banyan tree still stood upright, its branches denuded of green and its sooty trunk transformed into an awkward skeleton.

The tree has dominated Lahaina for 150 years, watching over an island that was an independent monarchy, then a US territory, and finally a full US state.

But the city it once guarded is now gone.