Hawaiian Air stems flow of red ink

The negative numbers came from non-operational costs such as debt repayment. The airline made its third consecutive quarterly profit on the operations side alone, flying the aircraft and carrying paying passengers and cargo.

The operating profit in the latest quarter was $659,000, compared with an operating loss of $3.2 million in the last quarter of 1994.

Fourth-quarter revenues of $92.6 million were up 21.8 percent from $76 million a year earlier.

Revenues for the fourth quarter and the year were up because flights were added to the airline's West Coast-Hawaii service, said Bruce R. Nobles, president and chief executive officer.

Hawaiian added a fifth weekly flight between Portland, Ore., and Honolulu in November. Earlier in the year, the airline began a Honolulu-Las Vegas charter service and added a third daily Los Angeles-Honolulu flight.

For all of 1995, Hawaiian had a loss of $5.5 million, well below the $12.9 million loss it reported for 1994.

Hawaiian had a $1.9 million loss from operations last year, compared with a $12.7 million operating loss the previous year. Last year's operating expenses of $349 million were up 9.4 percent from expenses of $319 million in 1994. Revenues of $347 million in 1995 were up 13.4 percent from $306 million in the previous year.

Hawaiian Airlines, which pioneered air service in Hawaii in 1929, undertook a bankruptcy reorganization in 1993. It emerged as a new company in September 1994, out of debt but short of cash.

In January, a mainland group invested $20 million in Hawaiian in return for control of the airline.

Nobles said yesterday that the 1995 operating results were part of a trend of improvement and the company is aiming at achieving profitability in 1996.

Hawaiian has 150 DC-9 jet flights a day among the islands and DC-10 services from Honolulu to Los Angeles, Las Vegas, San Francisco and Portland.