Q re: Flights to Hawaii

[patterson3]

If this has been discussed before, I apologize, but I was wondering why no airline appears to offer any overnight flights from the east coast to Hawaii? From a customer's point of view it seems like an overnight flight would be far preferable to wasting a day in-flight. And if two companies offered similar prices for flights to Hawaii and one left the east coast at 7AM (and I had to waste an entire day flying) vs. one that departed at around 10PM (and I could sleep onboard and not lose a day of sunshine traveling) it would be a no-brainer which to choose....Which leads me to believe there has to be a reason none are offered....?

[hdawson]

Checkin time for most hotels is 3PM? Not 6AM.

[paul929207]

What time would you arrive in Hawaii on your overnight flight? The only non-stop from the New York area now is a Continental flight that leaves Newark at 1:30pm and arrives Honolulu at 6:10pm. So your 10:00pm flight would get to Honolulu around 2:40am. What would you do in Honolulu at 3am or 4am? You would have to wait about 12 hours to checkin to your hotel? or 9 hours to board you cruise ship.

[patterson3]

But airlines always have flights arriving early in the morning at different places, so why should hawaii be any different? Personally I'd rather have the option of arriving early in the morning in Hawaii (after having slept on the plane) and having to kill some hours before I could check into my hotel than having to waste an entire day in-flight....

 

But thanks for your responses. I gotta dmit I never really considered the hotel reason. But it makes sense....

[fbgd]

I gotta dmit I never really considered the hotel reason. But it makes sense....

 

The hotel thing isn't really an issue. There are plenty of places where arriving or departing in the middle of the night is normal.

 

Airlines want to utilise their aircraft to the maximum, keeping aircraft time on the ground to the minimum. The airlines have more than likely figured out that a sort of overnight flight to Hawaii fits in poorly for aircraft utilisation purposes, causing the aircraft to be on the ground longer than necessary either in Hawaii or upon return to the US East Coast.

 

There is some element of passenger popularity with flight timings but it isn't the major driving force.

[Aerocruiser]

Remember also that there are not a ton of flights from the east coast to the Pacific period. Most flights to Asia depart from the Pacific coast (LAX, SFO, even SEA and PDX have one or two). The wide-body jets are desperately needed for the trip fly to Europe from the east, at least on American carriers (the exception is Continental, who does not really have a true hub on the west coast and does fly EWR/IAH-HNL). Why fly a moderate-yielding, large aircraft for 9+ hours to Hawaii, when it could be flown full to Europe? Nowadays, it's even a stretch to find longhaul jets flying to Hawaii from any place in the US, which I think attests to a definite drop in demand.

 

Still, US Airways has been cutting back a bit internationally, freeing up a 767 to start CLT-HNL (poor business planning, IMO) sometime later this year (though I'm not sure when it departs).

 

Don't forget that the silver lining to stopping along the way is that you will have an opportunity to get off the plane and stretch!

[Globaliser]

But airlines always have flights arriving early in the morning at different places, so why should hawaii be any different?

Relatively few places have flights arriving that early in the morning - it's really the middle of the night. Those places that do tend to be places where it's acceptable to schedule departures for the middle of the night, which can be commercially uncompetitive if there are better departure times. Also, it's often the case that these are flights or places where a large proportion of the passengers are simply transiting, or where the originating flights are at times that correspond to those of transiting flights.

 

On this, you also have to look at what is the effect of the departure time.

 

For example, if there were a 10 pm departure from the east coast, arriving HNL sometime around 3 am, how many people would book an 5 am departure from HNL for the east coast?

 

Or, if the aircraft were made to sit around for three more hours until 8 am, how many people would book that when it wouldn't arrive back at the east coast airport until about 11 pm?

[odblnt]

Actually, we do have a fair number of flights arriving between 8 and 9 am, but these are normally from Asia (Korea and Japan especially). In the case of tour groups, they load them up on buses and take them around the Island. We like to joke that you can always tell those first day tour groups.

[FlyerTalker]

Yep...have been on the NW flight NRT-HNL....leaves Tokyo at either 8pm or 9:30pm and gets in the next morning (12 "clock" hours later). From that side of the world, early morning arrival at HNL works, because of the departure time from NRT. Then the flight turns around in a couple of hours (arriving afternoon/early evening) and repeats the cycle.

[kenish]

The biggest consideration as others mentioned is aircraft utilization. You don't leave a $150 million asset sitting around doing nothing.

 

Also flight times out of EWR and HNL needs to provide time for connecting passengers to "hub in" from other East Coast or Hawaii airports. Most inter-island flights operate between 7am-9pm so the departure time from HNL needs to be late enough to allow connections.

 

The EWR-HNL flight is even more complicated because it continues to Guam and Cairns. The timing has to work for all 4 airports in both directions.

 

The other thing not mentioned is staffing. Airlines want all flights to arrive around the same time, keep employees busy handling all the incoming and departing flights, then go home and be "off the clock" as soon as possible. Arrival time of CO1 / CO2 matches Continental flights from the West Coast and IAH.

[surfgram]

I think that the "red-eye" overnight flights really only work going west to east. Hawaii to the west coast has quite a few. I could be wrong, but I can't think of any overnight flights going east to west.

[FlyerTalker]

I think that the "red-eye" overnight flights really only work going west to east. Hawaii to the west coast has quite a few. I could be wrong, but I can't think of any overnight flights going east to west.

Well, the SQ flight from EWR to SIN leaves at 11pm....arrives SIN at 5:50am.

 

Then again, the flight lasts 18:50, so that pretty well explains how it can work going east to west. (So for all of you who have spouses that complain about how long the flight is...you can tell them it could be MUCH longer!)

 

But yes....over shorter distances (such as transcon USA) you don't find that type of scheduling.

[fbgd]

Well, the SQ flight from EWR to SIN leaves at 11pm....arrives SIN at 5:50am.

 

Then again, the flight lasts 18:50, so that pretty well explains how it can work going east to west. (So for all of you who have spouses that complain about how long the flight is...you can tell them it could be MUCH longer!)

 

But yes....over shorter distances (such as transcon USA) you don't find that type of scheduling.

 

Over shorter distances there are some very ugly flight times out there, particularly on charter airlines within Europe.

 

I am aware of a couple of awful timed BA flights that head west.

Amman-London leaves at 4.05am and at 7.50am.

Moscow-London leaves at 5.50am and lands at 6.55am.

 

Slightly longer but there's one flight that leave Dubai at 2am and touch down @ LHR at 6.20am.

 

There are a lot of European bound flights from India and Asia that leave in the middle of the night and arrive early the next morning, or leave late evening and do the same thing. With that many time zones involved it isn't really surprising.

[Globaliser]

Slightly longer but there's one flight that leave Dubai at 2am and touch down @ LHR at 6.20am.

That's mine!

 

It also illustrates the circumstances in which you can operate departures in the middle of the night: The eastbound aircraft arrives from London at about 10.30 pm, which gives you ample time to get to a hotel or whatever before your body starts complaining that it's the middle of the night - especially if your body clock is running on London time, which is 3 hours behind Dubai at the moment.

 

The aircraft doesn't sit around in Dubai for very long. The westbound flight then gets you into London in time to start the new day, which is handy if you don't want to waste a day travelling. If you're running on London time, the 2 am departure is actually an 11 pm departure for your body clock, so this is just in time to go to sleep. If you take either of BA's two daylight westbound flights, you basically lose a day sitting on the aircraft.

 

There is a huge peak in long-haul arrivals in London between 6 am and 8 am precisely because people want to get here and get stuck into a new day.

 

So using overnight flights in both directions, I can do a true "weekend" in Dubai, arriving first thing in the morning on Saturday and flying back on Sunday night/Monday morning. (Of course, it's complicated by the fact that the weekend in Dubai is Friday and Saturday, but not everything can be easy.)