A damaged PBY could have raised Pearl Harbor alertness

Could a PBY surviving an encounter with Japanese aircraft have changed the Pearl Harbor attack?

It might have increased alertness if it reported the contact or returned damaged, though that warning would not necessarily have prevented the attack.

This counterfactual turns on warning time. A PBY that survived contact long enough to send a message or return with bullet holes would have supplied concrete evidence that Japanese aircraft were nearby. That warning could have changed the defenders' level of alertness. One patrol aircraft would not automatically avert the attack. The scenario remains an early-warning possibility rather than a rewritten outcome.