Kevin Knodell reports on military affairs, veterans, security and diplomacy in Hawaii and the greater Pacific for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. He is an alum of Report For America, a nonprofit that places journalists in local newsrooms to cover underreported topics. As a freelance correspondent he has reported from the frontlines in the Syrian conflict, wildfires in the American west and covered Iraqi Kurdistan's nightlife.
His writing and photography have appeared in The Daily Beast, Foreign Policy Magazine, Playboy, The Nib, Coffee or Die Magazine, Vice and others. He is the co-author of the graphic novels Machete Squad and The 'Stan.'
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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Today
- Updated 7:14 am
The report was prompted by a spill of 19,000 gallons of jet fuel from the Navy’s underground Red Hill facility that in November 2021 made its way into and tainted the Navy’s Oahu water system.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 16, 2024
Taiwan is seeking to increase the size of its military attache office at its de facto consulate in Honolulu as the self-ruled island democracy looks to tighten ties with the United States and bolster defenses against potential Chinese military attacks.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 14, 2024
In a letter to the U.S. Office of National Marine Sanctuaries in September, American Samoa’s Gov. Lemanu Mauga wrote that “fishing prohibitions not only weaken U.S. fisheries but also increase seafood imports and jeopardize U.S. food and national security.”
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 14, 2024
The Army will be lighting controlled burns at its Schofield Barracks training range complex this week in an effort to prepare for and prevent potential wildfires as Hawaii’s rainy season dries up.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 10, 2024
The Coast Guard’s Honolulu-based “Indo-Pacific Support Cutter” CGC Harriet Lane returned to port Tuesday after its first patrol across Oceania.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 8, 2024
The United States and the Independent State of Samoa on Friday signed an addendum to an existing 2012 agreement to continue and expand cooperation to tackle transnational crime at sea, including a provision that essentially deputizes U.S. Coast Guard patrols to enforce Samoan regulations within the island nation’s territorial waters.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 5, 2024
On Thursday, the U.S. Pacific Fleet held a change of command ceremony at Pearl Harbor’s Kilo Pier as Adm. Samuel Paparo handed command to Adm. Steve Koehler.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 2, 2024
Lou Conter, the last survivor of the USS Arizona, died Monday morning at his home in Grass Valley, Calif., at the age of 102.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 1, 2024
According to a media release from Pacific Historic Parks, Conter died peacefully surrounded by his family.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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April 1, 2024
The U.S. and Australian militaries have conducted a successful missile intercept test off of Kauai.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 31, 2024
State and federal officials say that water tested at Hickam Elementary School for potential petroleum contamination is safe after an “unvalidated” test found high levels early this month.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 29, 2024
Two years after the Pentagon agreed it would remove fuel from its underground Red Hill fuel storage facility and shut it down, the military task force charged with removing fuel stored in the Navy’s underground Red Hill facility has officially concluded its mission.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 28, 2024
In early March the Navy notified the Environmental Protection Agency that it had detected “unvalidated test results” finding high levels of total petroleum |hydrocarbons, or TPH, in water samples taken from an on-base school and a home in the Aliamanu Military Reservation — both of which had their water systems flushed.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 25, 2024
In American Samoa, tuna is the lifeblood of the economy. Canned tuna accounts for 95.5% of all exports, and all of that tuna is canned at the StarKist Samoa cannery in Pago Pago.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 23, 2024
Meetings have often been contentious, with members of the Red Hill Community Representation Initiative and from the community frequently accusing officials of withholding information and dodging questions.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 20, 2024
As the military tries to highlight progress on efforts to close the Navy’s underground Red Hill fuel facility, members of the Red Hill Community Representation Initiative are accusing the federal government of walking back on its commitments to transparency ahead of a public meeting scheduled for Thursday.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 16, 2024
The Medal of Honor is the highest honor bestowed on military personnel and is personally awarded by the sitting president.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 15, 2024
The U.S. ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns, expressed cautious optimism about the state of relations between the two countries during a webinar hosted Thursday by the East-West Center in Manoa.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 8, 2024
The last known Pearl Harbor attack survivor living in Hawaii was laid to rest Thursday alongside his late wife at the Hawaii State Veterans Cemetery in Kaneohe.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 7, 2024
After months of work, on Wednesday the military task force charged with removing the fuel from the Navy’s underground Red Hill storage facility announced it had extracted the last of the “accessible residual fuel” from the facility.
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- By Kevin Knodell kknodell@staradvertiser.com
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March 6, 2024
The Navy announced this week that it will continue monitoring its Oahu water system, which serves 93,000 people, for the next year after a surge in complaints about water and air quality in homes on the military waterline.
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