Hawaiian Air resumes
flights to Samoa
Hawaiian Airlines was to resume flights to American Samoa today for the first time in two weeks, allowing an estimated 2,400 stranded passengers to leave.
The carrier, which suspended all flights between Honolulu and Pago Pago International Airport on June 24 due to the runway's substandard condition, said yesterday it will resume service at 4:45 this afternoon.
Hawaiian also said it has regular flights scheduled for tomorrow and Monday and will operate an additional one or two special round-trip flights per week, including one this Sunday, until the backlog of passengers is cleared out.
Hawaiian said a Federal Aviation Administration inspection of the repaired runway Tuesday concluded it meets federal standards. The runway is scheduled for repaving in August.
"We've received the necessary assurances that the repairs have solved the immediate problems and that an effective inspection and maintenance program is in place," said Mark Dunkerley, Hawaiian's president and chief operating officer.
The airline, which was forced to cancel six round trips, also plans to carry all undelivered mail to American Samoa on today's flight. Hawaiian is the principal carrier of commercial mail to the island.
On Sunday the U.S. Postal Service contracted with a cargo carrier to fly about 42,000 pounds of mail to Western Samoa, and then had the mail barged over on a six-hour boat ride to Pago Pago.
Hawaiian will be using a different check-in area at Honolulu Airport for its first four flights to Pago Pago to streamline the check-in process. Passengers will be checked in at Lobby 4 in the main terminal at counters used during different hours by Air Canada. Only passengers holding confirmed reservations will be accommodated on the day of departure at the airport.
The airline also said its reservations department will call every passenger who held seats on flights that had to be canceled, starting with those who have been waiting the longest, to offer them the next available seats on either scheduled or special flights.
Hawaiian Flight 465, which will depart the airport at 4:45 p.m. each of the scheduled days, will arrive in Pago Pago at 9:10 p.m. Return Flight 466 departs Pago Pago the same day at 11:05 p.m. and arrives in Honolulu the next day at 5:20 a.m.
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Saint Louis football
coach endures odyssey
to return to Hawaii
What is normally a five-hour flight to Honolulu from American Samoa turned into a three-day odyssey for a dozen professional athletes, coaches and other volunteers who went there to hold a free football clinic for kids.
The group, including Darnell Arceneaux, new head football coach at Saint Louis School, was stranded in American Samoa after Hawaiian Airlines temporarily canceled flights June 24 because of runway problems at Pago Pago International Airport.
The action left both the passengers and airline frustrated.
"Halfway during the week, we hear the airport had shut down, so we get in touch with HAL to see if we can be rerouted out of Western Samoa," said Arceneaux. "I guess they said 'no' because it was Pago Pago Airport's fault.
"They kind of left us stranded with no stipend for hotels or anything. They gave us the runaround," he said.
Noting he was going through a transition because of his new Saint Louis job, Arceneaux said he spent more than $200 on phone cards to try to do business over the phone. He was supposed to be back here June 28 for a Hawaiian Islanders' game but did not get home until Friday, he said.
Keoni Wagner, Hawaiian Air spokesman, said passengers were given the option to use their tickets on future flights or turn them in for a full refund. The standard $100 fee to change tickets was waived for customers traveling to and from Pago Pago, he said.
But he said airline carriers are not responsible under government regulations for hotel, meal, transportation or other expenses when flights are canceled because of circumstances beyond the airline's control.
"We frequently do things we're not legally required to do, but in this instance the cost of doing that is prohibitive" because of the hundreds of people affected by cancellation of flights between Honolulu and American Samoa, Wagner said.
The airline sustained expensive damage to two aircraft and has had a loss of business that cannot be calculated, Wagner said.
However, he said: "This is not about money. We're very frustrated by this whole situation because we know how much the community in American Samoa depends on us. We've been working night and day the past two weeks to try and get the runway up and running."
He said Hawaiian Air has worked closely with the governor's office in American Samoa, the FAA and airport authority, including looking into Apia, Western Samoa, as a potential alternate landing spot. But this is fraught with logistical and other problems, he said.
Wagner said all passengers who gave the airline telephone numbers when making reservations were contacted when it was decided to suspend service.
However, Rick Sakata, of the Big Island, vice president of the Joe Salave'a Foundation, which sponsors the annual football clinic for American Samoan youths, said his group was told "absolutely nothing. ... I was even calling friends of mine with Hawaiian in Hawaii trying to get some answers."
Sakata said he and the foundation, headed by Salave'a, of the Baltimore Ravens, paid about $20,000 in extra expenses for food, hotels, ground transportation and airline flights to get 12 of the 13 volunteers home. One coach remained behind, he said.
"The way we felt, we paid Hawaiian a premium fare to go there and come back, so our gripe is with you (Hawaiian Air), no matter whose fault it is."
Sakata arranged for the group to leave American Samoa July 2 for Western Samoa. They stayed there overnight and flew to Fiji.
They had a 10-hour layover in Fiji, then a 10-hour flight on Polynesian Airlines to Los Angeles. After a five-hour layover there, they flew to Oahu, arriving Friday night.
Two couples from the neighbor islands, including Sakata and his wife, had to stay overnight on Oahu and did not get home until Saturday afternoon.