Originally Posted by
dhuey
The timing for this mechanical was really bad -- the passenger loads were probably very high to Hawaii on Saturday due to the beginning of spring break for a lot of kids. Yes, lots of other potential flights, but they might have had very few empty seats.
Flight 73 departs at 4:40pm and according to the article they we're kept on the plane for 3 hours which would have them back at the terminal at 7:40pm. The last flight to HNL had already departed by that time.
As others have said, with the Easter and Spring break crowds I doubt there were many open seats available on any flight Sunday. Add to that the fact that no passengers have posted to FT who were on UA73, it sounds like the bulk were infrequent travelers who don't have the experience to know what to do in irrops like this.
In fact, this is one of the best times of years for bumps on flights to Hawaii (and from Hawaii in the next 1-2 weeks).
