3-alarm fire rattles visitors in Waikiki

A three-alarm fire at a high-rise hotel sent rattled guests into the streets of Waikiki on Monday night and prompted the closure of Kalakaua Avenue, but there were no reports of injuries.

Crews promptly extinguished the blaze at the 496-room Waikiki Beachcomber By Outrigger, 2300 Kalakaua Ave.

The Honolulu Fire Department said that the first units arrived at 8:46 p.m. and found no signs of smoke or fire from the exterior of the building. Firefighters found the fire elevators were not working, so they had to investigate on foot. They found that the fire began near a storage room on the 14th floor. Occupants in unit 1417 requested help to evacuate, but were told to shelter in place because a fire sprinkler system had controlled the fire.

The fire was reported in unit 1417 at 8:36 p.m. and extinguished by 9:13 p.m.

Fifteen fire units with 57 personnel responded to the blaze, which sent smoke billowing into at least three floors — the 14th, 15th and 16th. There was no early estimate of damage from flames or smoke. Smoke is mainly in the middle of the 28-story hotel.

Firefighters then began checking to see if all guests had evacuated from the affected floors.

Meanwhile, scores of hotel guests waited downstairs and across the street from the hotel.

Douglas Gels, 53 of Washington, D.C., said he and three friends were dining at the hotel restaurant on the first floor when they were informed of the fire.

“Very, very calmly, everyone was asked to evacuate,” Gels said.

He and his friends are all staying above the 14th floor.

Leah Gawel and her family from Melbourne, Australia, were having dinner in the hotel restaurant when the fire alarm went off.

“The alarm was going on for a half hour and they said it was a drill,” Gawel said.

Gawel, her husband and two children, ages 11 and 9, sat on the lawn across from the hotel following the evacuation.

“There’s just no communication. Police are standing around but nobody is saying anything,” she said.

Kalakaua Avenue, a one-way artery through Waikiki, was immediately closed, with traffic being rerouted onto Seaside Avenue.

Upper-floor fires pose a particular challenge to fire crews, in part because ladder trucks are effective only to about the fifth floor.

One of the most disastrous fires in Hawaii history occurred in July 2017 at the Marco Polo condominium. Four people died and 13 were injured in the blaze, which started on the 26th floor and spread to the 28th.