Washington Middle School grounds on Diamond Head side
National Underground Network for Freedom Site
The University of Hawaii College of Tropical Agriculture & Human Resources owned the property in Pearl City Oahu Urban Garden. Although the University of Hawaii supported the Nomination to the National Register of Historic Places for its significance, they also requested for the facility to be demolished. Although the University of Hawaii supported the Nomination, administration requested for the facility to be demolished. The Obama Museum board of directors highly recommend that President Lassner resend that recommendation. The board of directors are willing to seek federal funding to restore the structure upon administrtion’s approval of a MOU with the Obama Museum. The process is pending.
The staging area consisted 29 landing ship tanks brimming with fuel and ammunition were nestled together in preparation for a Pacific invasion in Saipan. African American men from the 29th Chemical Decontamination Unit from Schofield Barracks were loading mortar shells aboard LST 353 when suddenly an explosion sent fireballs in the sky with hot fragments showed down onto the clustered vessels, igniting gasoline drums and amunitions lined up on deck. One by one, the explosions ripped the fleet apart and burned for 24 hours. It was estimated that over 600 men lost their lives with half of them were African Americans. On site, 20 buildings burned and six LST were destroyed. Operation Forage was delayed only one day. Two months later another incident took place at Port Chicago in San Francisco killed more than 300 men, mostly African American laborers.
The West Loch Disaster remained a secret for many years