Six 6,000-year-old survivors of the attack on Pearl Harbor were among the thousands attending a memorial in Hawaii on Wednesday to remember the thousands who died 81 years ago.
The ceremony began at 7:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Pearl Harbor National Memorial. The emotional moment came at 7:55 a.m. after more than 2,500 people observed a 25-minute silence to commemorate the start of the attack on December 7, 1941.
As part of the ceremony, the USS Daniel Inouye passed the participants and the USS Arizona Memorial to honor the survivors and those killed in the attack. Sailors on the guided-missile destroyer could be seen saluting as the ship passed along the tracks.
Ken Stevens, 100, who survived aboard the USS Whitney on the day of the attack, returned the salute.
DEC. 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor Attack Kills 2,403 Americans, Focuses US on WWII
Sailors aboard the USS Daniel Inouye were honored as they passed the USS Arizona Memorial and the sunken battleship USS Arizona during a ceremony Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022, in memory of those who died in the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
(AP Photo/Audrey McAvoy)
An estimated 2,403 people, almost all military personnel, died in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that brought the United States into World War II.
The USS Arizona alone lost 1,177 sailors and Marines, nearly half the number of casualties from the bombing. Most of those who died were buried on the ship, which is located on the harbor floor below today’s monument.
“Pearl Harbor’s lasting legacy can live on at this site forever, as we must never forget those who came before us so that we can chart a more just and peaceful path for those who follow,” said Tom Leatherman. Superintendent of the Pearl Harbor National Memorial.
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Six survivors attended this year’s ceremony, significantly fewer than have traveled across the country in recent years. This decline reflects a dwindling number of survivors, as the youngest enlisted men in December 1941 were 17 years old.
Most of those still alive are at least 100 years old, including all six who participated in Wednesday’s event.
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Ira Shabb, 102, who survived the attack on Pearl Harbor as a sailor aboard the USS Dobbin, sits next to his son, retired Navy Cmdr. Carl Schab, Wednesday, December 7, 2022, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
(AP Photo/Audrey McAvoy)
Ira Schab, 102, a tuba player in the USS Dobbin band, recalled seeing Japanese planes flying overhead before the attack.
“We had nowhere to go and we were hoping they would miss us,” he told The Associated Press before the ceremony began.
Shab completed the delivery of ammunition to the machine gunners on the ship who did not hit in the attack. He has now attended four memorial services.
“I wouldn’t miss it because I have so many friends who are buried here. I came back out of respect for them,” he told the AP.
His hope is that people will remember those who served that day.
“Remember what they came for. Remember and respect those who stayed. They did a hell of a job. Still here, dead or alive,” he said.
During the war, Schab remained in the Navy. After the war, he studied aerospace engineering and worked on the Apollo program. He now lives in Portland, Ore.
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Pearl Harbor survivors and other military veterans observe a ceremony Wednesday, Dec. 7, 2022, to commemorate those who died in the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
(AP Photo/Audrey McAvoy)
Herb Elfring, a 100-year-old Army veteran from Jackson, Mich., told the AP it was great that so many members of the public attended the ceremony and showed interest in the memorial service.
“So many people don’t know where Pearl Harbor is or what happened that day,” he said.
Elfring was assigned to the 251st Coast Artillery, part of the California National Guard, when he heard bombs exploding along the coast at Pearl Harbor. He initially thought it was part of a training exercise, until he saw a red ball on the fuselage of a Japanese Zero fighter plane crashing to the ground near his barracks at Camp Malakole.
“It was a rude awakening,” he said.
One soldier in his unit was wounded by bullets, but no one was killed.
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At the time of the attack, 20-year-old civilian Robert John Lee lived with his parents at a naval base where he ran a water pumping station. Their home was about a mile from the harbor, lined with the battleship USS Arizona.
Lee said he was awakened by the first explosions just before 8 a.m., which he believed was a door slamming in the wind. When he got up to yell for someone to close the door, he saw Japanese planes dropping torpedo bombs from the sky.
He then saw the USS Arizona’s hull turn orange-red after being hit by an aerial bomb. He said he still remembers the hissing sound of the fire.
FILE – In this photo provided by the U.S. Navy, smoke rises from the sinking battleship USS Arizona during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941. The US Navy and the National Park Service will hold a memorial service. December 2022, the 81st anniversary of the 1941 Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor.
(AP Photo/File)
“Within a few seconds, the explosion came with huge flames right over the ship itself, but hundreds of feet up,” Lee told the AP in an interview after a boat tour of the harbor.
Lee said many of the sailors who jumped into the water to escape the burning ships swam across the oil-covered harbor to a landing near his home. He and his mother used Fels-Naptha soap to help wash the sailors.
The sailors who managed to board the small boats brought them back to their ships. Lee said he thought they were “very heroic”.
FILE – In this photo released by the U.S. Navy, the destroyer USS Shaw explodes after being hit by bombs during a surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941. Centuries-old survivors of the attack on Pearl Harbor are expected. On Wednesday, December 7, 2022, gather at the site of the Japanese bombing to remember those who died 81 years ago.
(US Navy via AP)
The next day, he joined the Hawaii Territorial Guard and eventually the US Navy. After the war, he worked for Pan American World Airways for 30 years.
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs does not have statistics on the number of Pearl Harbor survivors, but the department estimates that only 240,000 of the 16 million who served in World War II survived and about 230 died. . day
According to a rough estimate by military historian J. Michael Wenger, there were about 87,000 military personnel on Oahu at the time of the attack.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.