N830MH

Yes, they can do that. This aircraft will have ETOPS overwater certified.

sdsearch

That fits perfectly with Southwest's point-to-point-to-point schedule.

They could do something like OAK-HNL-OGG-OAK while doing SMF-OGG-HNL-SMF, and there they have it, two-way inter-island service between OGG and HNL without flying the same plane back and forth.

I chose SMF as the other example mainland airport (adding to OAK which ncorman suggested), as I would guess that Southwest might want to pick airports from which the legacies including Alaska don't fly to Hawaii but where Southwest does a lot of flying [to other places] already. Legacy airlines tend to pick flights originating at their hubs or focus cities. But to Southwest, just about every city they serve is a focus city of sorts, especially around California. BUR-to-Hawaii, anyone?

Hawaiian717

The -300s and -400s were how Aloha discovered the CFM56's problems with ultra short haul, high frequency operations. They were eventually returned in favor of sticking the the -200s for interisland flights. Aloha's -700s were used primarily on west coast flights, IIRC when they did use them interisland due to issues with the aging -200s, they started to see the same problems.

Running interisland legs between west coast flights (like a triangle route) won't cause problems, but if Southwest tries to run a dedicated interisland operation, they'll probably be wishing they'd kept some of AirTran's 717s. The BRR715 engine on the 717 and the JT8D on the DC-9 and 737-200 don't have the issues with interisland operations that the CFM56 does.

uastarflyer

Great news. If only to make UA and others compete on price.

I hope I will be able to use my 2018 CP at least once to Hawaii

chrisj85

Today's Star-Advertiser quoted WN exec as saying there won't be enough flying for a crew base here at HNL, so it seems unlikely there will be any major amount of interisland flying and certainly no dedicated sub-fleet based at HNL to do it. A few interisland flights as part of triangle routes won't make much of a dent against HA, who has 18 717s flying pretty much hourly service on the main routes with even greater frequency at peak times.

Routes from places like BUR to HNL would be nice - not having to deal with LAX when I go to So Cal would be a pleasant improvement.

trooper

For a flight that long I hope they go to assigned seating or take a serious look at the "claiming" of multiple seats by a single early boarder.

user123

mainland city guess ? OAK ?

ryw

To me OAK and LAX would make the most sense initially given WN's network (and those are already 2 west coast gateways for their international flights), though both of those will face competition - Hawaiian and Alaska in OAK; Hawaiian and the legacies in LAX).

Given the big increase at SMF next year, I could see them eventually adding a flight there (though I think Hawaiian and Alaska also have flights from there). LGB and SNA seem unlikely given gate space. I'd personally love a BUR or ONT flight to Hawaii if the demand can make it work - the plus for WN is there's no one else serving direct flights to Hawaii from those 2

tmiw

There was a rumor that SAN was going to be one of them too. No idea if that'll actually happen though.

Kevin AA

Could a 737 take off from BUR for Hawaii? The runway isn't very long.

Amicus

LAS to HNL makes a lot of sense. Lots of WN flights into LAS already. Plus, Allegiant is ending its service to HNL out of here.

SiriusRon

Aloha ran BUR-HNL service for a period of time beginning in 2004. The runway is pretty short at 6,886 feet; perhaps the flight was weight restricted?

jk88usa

My Guess would be LAS, OAK, and PHX if the aircraft have the range for Vegas and Phoenix. LAX has a lot of competition even for WN if they are just getting started

This way they can offer connections all over the place versus limiting it to a west coast only op. (I.e. a 630a flight from HNL-LAS could be in LAS well in time to make the later afternoon/evening batches going East, even offering connections to far off places like BUF for example). This also prevents having to run red-eyes

N830MH

No, they won't have assigned seating. Those customers can pick any seats if they want. It's their choice.


Yes, there is correct. Allegiant is no longer flies to HNL. They tried and also, they tried AZA-HNL, FAT-HNL, BLI-OGG, LAX-HNL and a few other route, as well. Those route who cannot support this and it didn't workout so well.

Seat13c

WN hasn't made a decision either way yet. Keep in mind that STL has over 100 flights daily and no crew base. Albeit, STL-closer points is definitely not the same as inter island flying, but the point about size and not having a crew base still stands.