Okinawan Railway

Every day I learn something new, and this time Okinawa surprised me.

Kadena station staff

Greetings, everyone! I recently visited the Prefectural Museum in Naha, Okinawa. There were a lot of interesting exhibits on the history, culture and life, geography and biology of the Ryukyu Islands, and among other things, I found some very interesting material. The Museum showed black and white photographs of the Okinawan Railway.

And yes, it was really a HUGE discovery for me.

As I wrote earlier, there is no other public transport on Okinawa except for buses (the monorail can be considered an exception, but elevated trains run only in Naha). So where did the old photos with steam locomotives come from? I started looking for information about the Okinawan railway.

As it turned out, there really was a railway here. In fact, it was a narrow-gauge railway, even its name - keiben tetsudō - means ‘light railway’; the width of the rail was 2 feet 6 inches, or 76 cm. The railway began operating in 1914.

By 1943, there were 4 lines on the island:

Naha - Yonabaru (Yonabaru line, 9.4 km)

Kohagura - Kadena (Kadena line, 22.3 km)

Kokuba - Itoman (Itoman line, 15.0 km)

Naha - Sanbashi Niatsukaisho (freight line, 0.9 km)

The railway has been developing for almost 30 years, but everything has changed.

During the preparations for the Battle of Okinawa, the railway ceased normal operations on 10 July 1944, when 13,000 men of the 9th Division of the Imperial Army began landing in Naha. From the next day, the railway operated mostly military trains. After an air raid on 10 October 1944 destroyed the Naha station, as well as two locomotives, four wagons, and six tourist cars, operations were not resumed until early November.

On 11 December 1944, a train on the Itoman line carrying weapons, ammunition, and fuel exploded for an unknown reason in Hebaru. About 210 soldiers, eight students and three railway workers on board were killed. By the number of deaths, this was the deadliest railway disaster in Japanese history.

The enemy attacks that preceded the landings (1 April 1945) forced the railway to cease operations at the end of March 1945.

After the war ended, the railway was never restored.

This is incredible - but it is true: Okinawa was developing rapidly (at least as a small island in the Pacific Ocean that does not have time to recover from the constant attacks of large empires), and there was already a developed railway connecting the largest cities on the island. There were workers here who were engaged in this, and people who used the train as everyday transport. And all this progress came to a sudden halt because of the war.

I chose a new goal - to research the history of the Okinawan railway in detail.

At the Museum, I saw a video presentation with photographs and even video documentation of the railway. I managed to film some of the material, and you will be able to see it soon.

This is only the first post about the Okinawan railway: while you wait, I am collecting new information that will be published soon. If you are interested in this topic, be sure to register on the site. This way you won't miss out on new content. If you have already done so, please share the link to this site on social media.

Thank you for your attention!