Titus

Does anyone know why there was a Qantas A380 parked in Honolulu today? It was parked on the east/northeast side of the airport.

screech

Medical diversion then crew hours.

mreed911

Not that I wouldn't want to travel my original trip, if I had to divert then diverting to Hawaii wouldn't hurt my feelings as much.

SFO777

It was last night's LAX-MEL QF 94. Flight was at least 1,200 miles past HNL and turned around.
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/Q...647Z/KLAX/YMML

Wow, 10.5 hours for LAX-HNL...



Departs HNL just before midnight tonight. Now arriving MEL 22 hours late. Hope the pax got nice hotel rooms for the day.
As mreed911 said, there are a lot worse places to have to divert for a day.

VHOEJ

Correct - QF94 diverted due to a medical and then had to overnight due to crew hours. Not a bad stopover if you ask me!

ollieinmelbourne

It certainly wouldn't be to operate a scheduled service; they use a clapped out old 767 for that (or Jet*).

AdMEL

As someone who has flown QF94 for leisure, I wouldn't be too annoyed at a HNL stopover! As long as it is not due to an uncontained engine failure, or wing issue!

cova

Same thing happened to my QF94 flight in Feb, 2010. We diverted to HNL after being 1 hour past HNL due to medical emergency. Had to dump fuel. We were on the ground for about 2 hours, since it took 1.5 hours to refuel (since HNL hoses are not big enough - ie filling the swimming pool with a garden hose). This was the first time an A380 had ever landed in HNL.

On landing - lots of fire trucks and police. The ground crew was out taking pictures. And some ground crew got tours of the airplane - to the displeasure of some passengers who were sleeping. It was 4am HNL time.

However in our case, QF got special exception to extend crew hours beyond the normal limit - but we had to land in SYD instead of MEL to shorten the extended crews hours.

QF provided a 330 or 747 to fiery passengers to MEL. Those going elsewhere went on different flights. Those going MEL-SYD were able to just stay in SYD.

At first they said SYD bound passengers would get their luggage - but that was too hard to sort out - so all the luggage went to MEL. So we got our luggage the next day. But for missed luggage QF is very good about providing compensation. If you go to QF city ticket office - they will give you $150AUD in cash to buy some items.

Titus

Thank you so much for all of the informative responses. It was a thrill to see an A380 parked in Honolulu! I hope the ill passenger is doing better, and that everyone else got to have a good time on Oahu. I'm very amazed with the website that shows the tracking flightpaths of the airplanes, and must learn how to use it, but I'm wondering how you knew which flight to search for on that website in the first place. Anyway, it's nice to know planes can land here in case they need to.

Himeno

Your post said "Qantas A380" and "Honolulu today". That gives all the info needed to narrow it down to 2 flights (QF94 or QF12). From there, it's just a quick look at qantas.com or going right to flightaware or expert flyer and checking those two flights.

VHOEJ

Yeah there is knock on effects and costs from a diversion but most important is the health of the passenger, apparently had a heart attack. Obviously some passengers would have had to get to Melbourne on that day but most of them would have arrived the next day and had thier connections changed without penalty. A 24 hour delay vs someone losing thier live.........no second thoughts

reubee

So how much rest can a crew get between 0700 and 2330 local time in HNL?

og

Approximately 16 hrs 30 min.

ButFli

A lot more than most workers get between shifts. Doctors, nurses, fellas up in the mines, security guards etc all work longer shifts with less time off in between.

Unless you're suggesting the crew may have been distracted by non-restful pursuits while in HNL. I could agree with that.

VHOQK

I was a passenger on Qf94 that diverted to Honolulu. Yes a passenger had a heart attack.

We were half way back to Melbourne when diverted back for a 2hr 40 min journey to Honolulu..

Qantas were fantastic, Breakfast vouchers for the airport, lunch and dinner vouchers for the hotel they put us up in for 10 hours. Bus transport to and from the hotel, couldnt have asked for anymore!!

Enjoyed the stop over Waikiki beach for a couple hours is something you cant complain about....

Honolulu does struggle to accept A380 with regards to aero bridges, so boarding did take some time...