Bob Fernandez thought he’d go dancing and see the world when he joined the U.S. Navy as a 17-year-old highschool scholar in August 1941.
Four months later, he discovered himself shaking from explosions and passing ammunition to artillery crews so his ship’s weapons might return hearth on Japanese planes bombing Pearl Harbor, a Navy base in Hawaii.
“When these issues go off like that, we did not know what’s what,” stated Fernandez, who’s now 100. “We did not even know we have been in a conflict.”
Godofredo A. Vásquez / AP
Two survivors of the bombing — every 100 or older — are planning to return to Pearl Harbor on Saturday to watch 83 years because the assault that thrust the U.S. into World War II. They will be a part of active-duty troops, veterans and members of the general public for a remembrance ceremony hosted by the Navy and the National Park Service.
Fernandez was initially planning to affix them, however needed to cancel due to well being points.
The bombing killed greater than 2,300 U.S. servicemen. Nearly half, or 1,177, have been sailors and Marines on board the USS Arizona, which sank throughout the battle. The stays of greater than 900 Arizona crew members are nonetheless entombed on the submerged vessel.
A second of silence shall be held at 7:54 a.m., the identical time the assault started eight a long time in the past. Aircraft in lacking man formation are resulting from fly overhead to interrupt the silence.
Dozens of survivors as soon as joined the annual remembrance however attendance has declined as survivors have aged. Today there are solely 16 nonetheless dwelling, based on an inventory maintained by Kathleen Farley, the California state chair of the Sons and Daughters of Pearl Harbor Survivors. Military historian J. Michael Wenger has estimated there have been some 87,000 navy personnel on Oahu on the day of the assault.
Mengshin Lin / AP
Many laud Pearl Harbor survivors as heroes, however Fernandez would not view himself that method.
“I’m not a hero. I’m simply nothing however an ammunition passer,” he instructed The Associated Press in a cellphone interview from California, the place he now lives along with his nephew in Lodi.
Fernandez was working as a large number prepare dinner on his ship, the USS Curtiss, the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, and deliberate to go dancing that night time on the Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Waikiki.
He introduced sailors espresso and meals as he waited tables throughout breakfast. Then they heard an alarm sound. Through a porthole, Fernandez noticed a aircraft with the purple ball insignia painted on Japanese plane fly by.
Fernandez rushed down three decks to {a magazine} room the place he and different sailors waited for somebody to unlock a door storing 5-inch (12.7-centimeter), 38-caliber shells so they may start passing them to the ship’s weapons.
He has instructed interviewers over time that a few of his fellow sailors have been praying and crying as they heard gunfire up above.
“I felt sort of scared as a result of I did not know what the hell was occurring,” Fernandez stated.
The ship’s weapons hit a Japanese aircraft that crashed into considered one of its cranes. Shortly after, its weapons hit a dive bomber which then slammed into the ship and exploded under deck, setting the hangar and foremost decks on hearth, based on the Navy History and Heritage Command.
Fernandez’s ship, the Curtiss, misplaced 21 males and practically 60 of its sailors have been injured.
“We misplaced a variety of good individuals, you already know. They did not do nothing,” Fernandez stated. “But we by no means know what is going on to occur in a conflict.”
After the assault, Fernandez needed to sweep up particles. That night time, he stood guard with a rifle to ensure nobody tried to come back aboard. When it got here time to relaxation, he fell asleep subsequent to the place the ship’s useless have been mendacity. He solely realized that when a fellow sailor woke him up and instructed him.
After the conflict, Fernandez labored as a forklift driver at a cannery in San Leandro, California. His spouse of 65 years, Mary Fernandez, died in 2014. His oldest son is now 82 and lives in Arizona. Two different sons and a stepdaughter have died.
He has traveled to Hawaii thrice to take part within the Pearl Harbor remembrance. This yr would have been his fourth journey.
Fernandez nonetheless enjoys music and goes dancing at a close-by restaurant as soon as per week if he can. His favourite tune is Frank Sinatra’s rendition of “All of Me,” a tune his nephew Joe Guthrie stated he nonetheless is aware of by coronary heart.
“The women flock to him like moths to a flame,” Guthrie stated.
