The suspected arsons began occurring a few days after the entire building was reopened to patrons March 28 for the first time since an October 2004 flood devastated the facility. It had partially reopened in January. Although the building is now fully operational, repair of the fire-alarm system was originally supposed to take another year; however, the incidents have caused officials to step up the timetable. In the meantime, a beefed-up security team is carrying manually operated aerosol horns, and the administration has installed a video surveillance system and begun requiring visitors to sign in and show photo identification, according to the April 7 Honolulu Advertiser.
“It’s upsetting to everybody, obviously,” said Allen Riedy, head of Hamilton Library’s Asian Collection, where a stack of newspapers was damaged by one of the fires. “We don’t quite understand what this person is up to.”
Posted April 8, 2005.