FL MORRIS / FMORRIS@STARBULLETIN.COM
Passengers waited for an interisland Hawaiian Airlines flight at Honolulu Airport last week.
Hawaiian to cut Faced with weak bookings for the one-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, Hawaiian Airlines will cut three round-trip flights between Hawaii and the mainland for that day.
3 mainland flights
on Sept. 11
The airline blames low interest for the 1-day change
By Tim Ruel
truel@starbulletin.com"It's just that bookings on these particular flights for that day are very weak," Hawaiian spokesman Keoni Wagner said.
Hawaiian is cutting one of its three daily round-trip flights between Honolulu and Los Angeles. The Honolulu-based airline is also dropping its daily round-trip flight between San Francisco and Maui, and the daily flight between Los Angeles and Maui.
Hawaiian had previously eliminated the Los Angeles-Maui flight in October 2001 when it reduced its schedule in the aftermath of Sept. 11. The route was resumed in June.
The San Francisco-Maui flight, also added in June, is a new service.
All three of the dropped flights are served by Hawaiian's 252-seat Boeing 767-300ER aircraft.
The cutbacks represent 6.7 percent of total seats for that day, Wagner said.
The cuts leave Hawaiian with one round-trip flight between Maui and the mainland on Sept. 11, serving Seattle, a service that started in March.
Aloha Airlines has no plans to cancel any mainland or interisland flights on Sept. 11, said Stu Glauberman, Aloha spokesman.
Sept. 11 falls on a Wednesday this year, a typically slow day of the week in a traditionally sluggish month. "We're expecting a typical Wednesday in the interisland business," Glauberman said.
Still, to boost business in September, Aloha has announced a special fare of $299 for round-trip flights between Hawaii and all five U.S. mainland locations it serves. The special is only for that month, and the deadline for ticket purchases is Friday.
Hawaiian has no specials that are specifically aimed at September, though it does have a variety of offers for travel between Aug. 27 and Dec. 15.
Nationally, the two largest U.S. carriers, American and United, have said they will make unspecified reductions for Sept. 11 because of weak bookings, and Delta is trimming flights for that entire work week.
One local travel agent reported that she sees no decrease in travel bookings for Sept. 11, to her surprise.
"I have lots of travelers in September," said Linda Espirito, an agent with International Travel Service of Honolulu. Espirito, like many people, had been expecting a drop.
