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Lualualei & West Loch Navy Railway Never officially called by that name, but it was actually the last of the officially operating railways on Oahu, run up until early 1970's. It ran from the Lualualei Ammunition Storage area down the old O.R.&L. track, across Fort Weaver Rd., and over to West Loch where battleships would take on their ammunition. |
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While covered in grass most of the way, the old Oahu Railway and Land Company (O.R.&L.) rails still supported these Vietnam Era "Ammo" trains which carried, among other things, 2700 pound shells for the battleship USS New Jersey during the Vietnam War. These were primarily used for shore bombardment, with the New Jersey firing seven times more rounds against shore targets in Vietnam than she had in WW-II. Several of these diesel electric locomotives had been around since WW-II and had been running during WW-II, and also again for the Korean War when several Navy battleships were called in for shore bombardment, including the now Pearl Harbor based museum piece, the USS Missouri. Below: A yet to be restored U.S. Navy Ammunition Boxcar at the Hawaiian Railway Society rail yard. These Navy boxcars also supplied Marine Corps Air Station Ewa and Barbers Point Naval Air Station. They can be seen today at the Hawaiian Railway Society's Train Museum in Ewa where most Sundays there are 90 minute train rides running. |
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U.S. Navy ammunition train, headed out of the Lualualei ammunition storage facility in 1966. |
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Many credit this last railway as the "genesis" of the Hawaiian Railway Society, as the Navy basically gave the HRS the remaining engines and boxcars that they had and officially "abandoned" the railway. Quick thinking by founding HRS member got the surviving track placed on the National Historic Register and the rest, as they say, "is history"... |
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Navy Railways on Oahu |
