JAL to restore
Honolulu flight
1 month early

The airline will add a third
Tokyo-Honolulu leg in May
due to increased demand

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By Russ Lynch
rlynch@starbulletin.com

Japan Airlines, which cut its three daily Tokyo-Honolulu flights down to two after Sept. 11, plans to replace the dropped flight in May, a month ahead of schedule.

Higher demand makes it possible, the airline announced in Japan. The country is still dragged down in its third recession in a decade but the travel outlook is improving, JAL said.

Bloomberg News quoted a JAL spokesman in Tokyo, Hirohide Ishikawa, as saying that Japan is seeing positive results from Hawaii campaigns, which started soon after Sept. 11, as well as efforts by travel agents to sell Hawaii as a destination.

Publicity from JAL's sponsorship of the Honolulu Marathon in December also lasted after the race. A tape shown on the Tokyo Broadcasting System in mid-January was seen by 2.3 million households in Japan, marathon spokesman Pat Bigold said.

"For all of the scenic shots shown in the program it was a nice bit of free advertising for the state," which does not sponsor the marathon, he said.

Others have said Japan's market is coming back, but there is concern that it may take years to meet the peak levels of the last decade, if it can be done at all.

Paul Brewbaker, chief economist of Bank of Hawaii, said yesterday that the market has shown signs of recovery but it is too soon to predict what will happen, given the lower value of the yen and the continuing recession in Japan.

Kiyoshi Mukumoto, Hawaii Visitors and Convention Bureau vice president-Japan, said last week he expects the number of flights from all parts of Japan to be fully back to normal by summer.

Airline passenger arrivals from Japan in the past week have risen from 25 percent below year-earlier levels to only 6 percent below, according to state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.

Economists say those figures are only a guide, because they don't separate Hawaii residents returning from Japan or travelers' purpose of stopping in Hawaii, but they do give a reasonable guide to what is happening.

JAL officials could not be reached yesterday for comment.