Fires on Oahu

It’s hard for most of us to understand the island-wide impact of the “Attack on Pearl Harbor.” Many of us know that the Japanese attacked all major military bases on Oahu. And some of us know that there were civilian casualties and private property damage. But the extent of it has been lost over time. There were fires in Honolulu, Ewa, Waipahu, Wahiawa, and in the cane fields of Central Oahu.

When a Honolulu Gas Company storage tank in Iwilei was hit, gas company employees, including women, helped firefighters by carrying sandbags to the top of the tank where gas was shooting out. The employees built a dike around the hole as the firefighters filled it with water and foam to extinguish the fire.


Three houses on Hauoli and Agaroba Streets burned; Lunalilo School was on fire. The school was being used as a first aid station, and when fire struck, nurses and first aid personnel treated 18 casualties on the lawn, with coconut trees as their only protection from attack.

At King and McCully Streets, a block of stores and homes burned, leaving three people dead and 31 families homeless. (One of the houses that burned belonged to a Honolulu Fire Department firefighter who was fighting fires at Hickam Field during the attack.)
Most of the damage on Oahu was the result of faulty American anti-aircraft artillery (“ack-ack”) falling undetonated. However, in Wahiawa, a low-flying enemy plane strafed stores, cars and wounded several people. Another enemy plane crashed in a pineapple field, burning down five homes; that fire was put under control by a handful of firefighters and a troop of Boy Scouts.

In Central Oahu, enemy planes attacked the electrical supply warehouses in the fields resulting in several cane fires. An unseen problem with that was that many women and children from the nearby towns fled their homes and hid from the planes---in the cane fields.

All over Oahu, women and children sought safety. Some families drove their children “over the mountains” (the Koolau) to stay with relatives on the windward side, thinking they’d be safer being out of Honolulu. Some sought safety in caves, tall cane fields, huddled together in living rooms, or under kitchen tables.

Many of the homes could not be rebuilt for at least two years after the attack because building materials were scarce. Ships from the mainland which normally carried supplies, were loaded with military equipment, troops, emergency food, and little for personal consumption.




Over the course of the day the Honolulu Fire Department logged in 37 major fires and four Honolulu Fire Department firefighters were killed while assisting military firefighters at Hickam Field.





PHOTOS: McCully area fires and the Lunalilo School fire. (HWRD)