KEAUHOU — A trash fire was quickly smothered because of the fast actions of a Good Samaritan motorist, Friday afternoon.
Mike Hardin was driving home on Alii Drive when he saw flames in front of an unoccupied commercial structure on the mauka side of the street south of the Kamehameha III Road intersection.
“I just pulled my truck over and ran up to the building,” Hardin said.
That’s where he saw a pile of what looked like trash burning dangerously close to the building. Spotting a hose, he said, he attempted to put the fire out. Another motorist stopped to call the fire department.
The Keauhou Fire Station responded and had the fire under control within minutes.
Hardin’s actions were called heroic by the Hawaii County Police Department. Without his intervention, an officer at the scene said, the unoccupied structure could have gone up in smoke.
Police detained a suspect approximately one quarter mile from the scene. No further information was available, the department said late Friday.