Honolulu International Airport getting air conditioner upgrade

Hawaii’s governor Linda Lingle announced that the Honolulu International airport was going to get a $19.57 million upgrade to its air conditioning systems. I will say this, with my last trip to Kona and sitting out in the sun waiting for my flight, it makes me realize how much I really miss air conditioning at airports.

Good News and Bad News for Hawaiian Air

Yesterday Hawaiian Airlines reported that it lost $19.9 million in the first quarter which made it’s stock go down but all was not lost for them yesterday. The good news for Hawaiian airlines was that it was announced that Mesa Air Group will have to pay Hawaiian $52.5 million in a legal settlement. Also Hawaiian’s CEO said that the outlook for Hawaiian for the rest of the year is positive due to ATA and Aloha going out of business. Hawaiian is hoping to at least break even or turn a profit by the end of the year.

Hawaiian Air to raise interisland ticket rates

Last year with the operation of Go, Aloha and Hawaiian Airlines all servicing flights to the interislands customers were seeing prices of $39 for a one way ticket. Now with Aloha Airlines no longer in business it was expected to see an increase in rates from Hawaiian and they just recently increased their fares by $5 to $20 for a one way ticket starting from today. Also Hawaiian has announced that it will be following other major long-haul carriers on June 10 by charging $25 extra for checking in a second piece of luggage on most mainland-Hawaii flights. Hopefully there will be no more increases in fares but it seems more than likely it will with the rising gas prices and the airlines losing more and more money each year.

California still Hawaii’s biggest market in regards to travel

In a recent report it has been found that in 2007 more people from California took more Hawaii vacations than anywhere else in the US. Last year 7.3 million visitors visited Hawaii and out of that 1.9 million came from California. The second most visitors came from the State of Washington which sent over 380,290. It should be interesting to see if these numbers drop in 2008 with the closure of ATA and Aloha.

What do all these airline problems mean for the future of Hawaii Travel?

The main thing that will happen with Hawaii travel is that there will be less seats to sell because of the closure by ATA and Aloha which will result in higher prices. It has been reported that with the closure of these two airlines that there will be about 1.1 million less seats to sell per year which comes out to 18% of all seats and with the supply lowered and the demand to come to Hawaii at and all time high, airlines now know they can get away with charging a higher fare to not only offset the gas prices but to hopefully help most turn a buck to help them get out of bankruptcy. This summer you can expect higher fares than usual to Hawaii despite an economic slowdown.

More Cancellations of flights for other airlines?

It sounds as though this week’s flight cancellations by American Airlines are more than likely to happen to other U.S. airlines in the coming weeks as federal regulators check for compliance with maintenance and safety orders issued in recent years. One of the first other airlines to have cancellations was Midwest Airlines on Thursday due to them re-inspecting a wiring harness which is the same issue that has forced American to cancel more than a couple of thousand flights and Alaska Airlines to cancel about 40 more in recent days. We’ll have more to come on this when we here something and if any more airlines cancels flights that will affect Hawaii travel.

American cancels more than 1,000 flights

The big news today is the announcement of American canceling 1,000 of it’s flights due to them inspecting the wiring on their jets. This has been a bad month so far with Aloha Airlines and ATA shutting down and now this. Hopefully this is the end of the bad news so that everyones summer travel is enjoyable.

Another Airline Shutdowns

ATA has just announced that they will no longer be in operation. That’s two airlines in basically one week to shutdown service after Aloha Airlines shutdown earlier this week. That’s really to bad that ATA is no longer in service because I used to use them and I know of a lot of people that used to fly to Hawaii for their vacations using them because of their great flight times and good rates.

Aloha Airlines Shutdowns

The big news hitting Hawaii travel is the complete shutdown of Aloha Airlines. They will no longer be providing airfare to Hawaii from the mainland to the Hawaii as well as providing inter island flights. The local government in Hawaii is trying everything possible to keep them operational not only to provide consumers as a way to get to Hawaii but to also save over 1,000 jobs. It should be interesting to see how this will affect the Hawaii tourism market in the future if they remain shutdown.

Hawaii Vacations, Deal or No Deal

Found a great article at Trans World News that says that 2008 is the year of the deal for Hawaii and especially for Hawaii Vacations. A lot of people are beginning to notice home prices in Hawaii dropping as well as hotel prices. Even though Hawaii may at times be a little more pricey than other places, there has never been a better time to find a great deal.