CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM A firefighter doused a patch of smoldering embers at the Mililani Agricultural Park yesterday.

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Fire in ag park
sends farmers
scrambling to
save livestock

The blaze is brought
under control after
burning 225 acres

Farmers feared for their crops and animals as a brush fire burned into the Mililani Agricultural Park before being contained last night.

The fire sent thick smoke over Central Oahu yesterday afternoon and continued an extremely busy week for Honolulu firefighters, who had been fighting Nanakuli brush fires since Sunday.

The Mililani fire was brought under control after burning about 225 acres, including part of the 500-acre agricultural park, but firefighters were called to another blaze late last night at Camp Timberline near the Nanakuli Forest Reserve.

At Mililani Agricultural Park, taro farmer Juanito Pascual, 58, said the flames came about 100 feet from tanks of propane and oxygen used for welding, and had burned their water line, cutting off their water supply.

"We were panicking out," he said. "We take the tiller inside, propane and oxygen tanks. That's one bomb right there."

The burned section of the park, formerly pineapple fields, had lain fallow for four years.

About 60 tenants, mostly small farms, nurseries and landscaping companies, lease space at the park, said the park's manager, Wayne Ogasawara. He said some basil and banana farms were on the fire side of the park, but "they were never close to being threatened."

Eight-year-old Brooke Fontanilla, who stood with her mother, Donna Akamine, watching the flames, had rushed to their vegetable and fruit farm to check on their 20 ducks and two dogs. Brooke said she was worried "mostly about the ducklings."

The fire began about 1:30 p.m. and employed 20 fire companies.

A hazardous-materials team, which responded to reports of hazardous chemicals stored in a shed, assisted in fighting the fire. The team found a few propane and oxygen tanks, likely empty, and a small amount of granular and liquid pesticides and herbicides.

Stiff west winds pushed the fire west through the agricultural park into the Waikele Stream ravine in what was formerly the Waikele Branch of Naval Magazine Lualualei, now known as Waikele Caves, fire Capt. Emmit Kane said.

Some private storage facilities and construction base yards are in the area, he said.

Three helicopters were able to assist almost immediately, said Kane, noting it usually takes time to mobilize helicopters.

He said it was fortuitous to have had four helicopters already working the Nanakuli fire. The 2,800-acre Nanakuli blaze, the largest brush fire of the season, was called 95 percent contained yesterday.

Air One and two military choppers were released to assist with the Mililani fire, leaving one military helicopter to mop up in Nanakuli.

"It was very key to containing the fire to where it did," he said. "Otherwise, this one could have grown in magnitude," extending west and threatening homes in Royal Kunia, he said.

Kane said fire investigators are working to find a cause for the blaze.