FlyingHoustonian

Myself and a colleague are going back to American Samoa for a couple of days for work.

1-do the PPG flights leave from the inter-island terminal at HNL?

2-Is an hour realistic to catch the 7am departure on AA with the 6am arrival from PPG (presuming on time, and that he is in biz on both)? I am on a later flight but my exec wants to chance the early one which I advise is a mistake but would like advice from the experts.

Mahalo

FlyinHawaiian

There's a finite number of gates in the inter-island terminal that can handle a widebody so more than likely you will be departing from the Ewa Concourse of the Overseas Terminal (see below). I believe you still check in with HA at the inter-island terminal and then walk or take the wikiwiki bus to Overseas.

Will you have checked bags and/or is the AA flight segment on the same ticket?

FlyingHoustonian

Thanks. I will be just on Hawaiian and might check a bag, but probably not for two-ish days. My exec will be coming in and going back to IAH/HOU on AA. He could book two PNRs or one depending on what is easier.

The booking says interisland terminal but then the flight receipt mailed to me just says "main terminal" so I was curious.

Mahalo for the help.

jeffhacker

Don't you have to clear customs/immigration at HNL coming back from Pago Pago? If so, there's no way you can connect from an international to a domestic at HNL in an hour.

chrisj85

I have been to PPG a couple of times and you must clear customs and immigration upon return to HNL, as American Samoa is a separate customs/immigration territory from the 50 states. I don't recall there being other international flights coming into HNL that early in the morning, but I have GE so didn't really notice the length of the regular lines. I think some of the Asian arrivals come in around that time or soon afterwards. Trying to make a one hour connection on your return would be risky. You might get by with it if you have GE and don't have the bad luck of getting selected for secondary inspection.

Otherwise, you will check-in at HNL in the interisland terminal, there is typically a separate counter for the PPG flight to the left of security while the interisland check-in is to the right. Then you clear security at interisland, most likely followed by an airside walk over to the Overseas Terminal (passing through the USDA checkpoint for your carry-on luggage along the way). Or you can take the WikiWiki bus, but it's really not that far of a walk.

Good luck with your PPG trip - my two trips there have had 41 hour and 18 hour delays on the return flights - one due to mechanical problems (turned around 2.5 hours out of PPG and returned) and the other due to bird strikes during landing of the inbound flight. Both times they had to fly a relief aircraft down to PPG to get us back to HNL.