Survivor recalls Pearl Harbor

POST FALLS - "We sure had a hot time here for awhile and I thought my end had come - God, was it hell. It was exactly 7:55 when I was almost tossed out of bed by a terrific roar and ensuing concussion. No one thought it was war until when we looked out our eastern windows and saw one of our new hangers in flames … we could see flames almost 500 feet high and huge clouds of smoke coming from Pearl Harbor. Somebody yelled, 'They are Japanese planes.' "

Each Dec. 7 Nick Gaynos pauses and temporarily puts the world aside.

"I put my hat on and thank the Lord I'm still here," the Pearl Harbor survivor and Post Falls resident said.

He counts his blessings as he carefully handles the World War II history that he shows off the most - shrapnel from a Japanese aerial torpedo that narrowly missed him at Hickam Field next to Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

"This went over my head and landed in front of me. I'm glad it missed me," the 90-year-old said with a grin.

Then his tone quickly turns serious.

"I felt that I faced my maker for the first time in my life that day," Gaynos said. "And He stood by me because it was hell on Earth."

Gaynos, who escaped injury, was a radio chief in the Army's 407th Signal Aviation Company at Hickam. He vividly remembers the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

He had just gone to bed at 4:30 that calm Sunday morning - as many soldiers had - when "hell" broke loose at 7:55.

"At first, we thought it was a mock raid by the Marines," Gaynos said. "Then there were bullets coming through our wooden barracks. When we ran outside, we saw the big red circle on the wings and realized those were Japanese aircraft."

Gaynos' first reaction was to tend to his duty - transmitting Morse code messages to Washington - but when he arrived at his radio station the antennae had been shattered by enemy fire.

Plan B after the mayhem, since there was no organized command, became gathering vehicles and soda pop since the water was rumored to be poisoned.

Gaynos said he recalled soda being stored in back of a nearby gas station, so he blasted off the lock with the pistol and loaded about 25 cases of pop on a truck. He also rounded up vehicles - keys were commonly left inside - and parked them next to his station as he realized transportation would be needed.

"I had liquid and transportation. I was ready for the rest of the war," Gaynos said. "It was quite an area of activity."

Gaynos kept the best car for himself to keep things moving.

"Later I found out I was using the general's car and I was wondering why everyone was saluting me," he said.

A second attack came at 10:20 a.m. as Gaynos and three other men were moving radio equipment. He laid in a small hole as bombs rained on the area.

"As the planes dove down at us, I would peek out under the brim of my tin helmet and see them spitting fire at us," Gaynos said. "The ground in front of me was spraying up. I emptied my .45 time after time right into their planes but it was futile."

He said three men nearby with machine guns were shooting at a plane when a bomb almost landed on them.

"It blew them sky high - gun and all," Gaynos said.

Gaynos went to the pit to see what he could do.

"One fella was covered with dirt and smiling, so I tried to pick him up but he fell apart in my arms," Gaynos said as his voice quivered. "I had trouble handling that."

Gaynos spent much of the day administering first aid and transporting the wounded and dead to the hospital. The next time he would sleep was Tuesday night.

He wrote a letter to his family in Bridgeport, Conn., by flashlight the night of Dec. 7.

" … God, was it hell," he wrote. "The thunder of bombs and the staccato of machine guns made such a deafening roar you had to yell to be heard a few feet away. The splintering of wood as .50-caliber bullets ripped through the wooden barracks was mixed with screams of men as they ran from one shelter to another.

"We soon collected our senses and the full realization of war was here. Some men cried, some laughed, others were terrified. And some just couldn't seem to understand what it was all about."

Gaynos, who later retired from the Air Force as a colonel in 1963, said discussing the events of what President Franklin D. Roosevelt called a "date which will live in infamy" helps him remember the service and sacrifice that he and his fellow soldiers made. He visited Pearl Harbor on its 50th and 55th anniversaries.

"I don't have nightmares, and I accept it for what it was," he said. "It was memorable, but not pleasant."