The only place there wasn't a traffic jam during Tuesday's tsunami warning were the runways at Hawai‘i's airports.
ICYMI: A tsunami warning was issued Tuesday afternoon, July 29, following a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off the coast of Kamchatka, Russia. Waves hit the Islands just after 7 p.m. that night, causing some flooding.
Evacuation orders snarled traffic in Honolulu and some fliers were grounded along with the planes at the state's airports as flights were canceled.
Alex Da Silva, regional communications director — Hawai‘i for Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines, told Aloha State Daily in an email that from the initial tsunami alert, and for the duration of the threat, “we remained focused on operating safely and minimizing disruptions to our guests.”
Hawaiian canceled 23 interisland flights on Tuesday out of some 150 it operates daily across the Islands and another five on Wednesday as the airline “repositioned aircraft and recovered the operation,” he said. Additionally, Alaska Airlines, which has acquired Hawaiian and is in the midst of a merger that will retain both distinct brands, canceled 15 flights on Tuesday and one on Wednesday between Hawai‘i and the U.S. West Coast, according to Da Silva.
Da Silva said that a few thousand passengers booked on Hawaiian’s 28 canceled flights were impacted by Tuesday’s tsunami warning.
“We offered a waiver for guests to modify their travel plans at no cost, and on Wednesday we increased capacity on five interisland roundtrips — two between Honolulu and Hilo, and three between Honolulu and Kahului — by flying our larger Airbus A321neo aircraft to ensure all guests could be accommodated.”
ASD also reached out to Southwest Airlines.
A spokesperson said in an emailed response that “Nothing is more important to Southwest Airlines than the safety of our customers and employees.”
The airline canceled or rerouted flights scheduled to either land in or take off from Hawai‘i Tuesday night, they said.
Because of the weather, Southwest experienced “brief airport closures and operational impacts overnight, including 25 cancellations to and from Hawai‘i,” the spokesperson noted. “We issued a travel advisory to allow affected customers to alter their travel plans without paying additional charges.”
ASD is also talking with airlines and other tenants at the airport about emergency preparedness.
The tsunami impacted global travel, with Newsweek estimating that in all, "More than 1,000 flights were canceled and 27,470 were delayed around the world on Wednesday after the Russian earthquake and Pacific tsunami."
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Stephanie Salmons can be reached at stephanie@alohastatedaily.com.
