Airlines Rush to Increase Rescue Flights as Maui Wildfires Rage On

Kahului Airport (OGG) on the Hawaiian island of Maui is one of the busiest airports in the state. The recent wildfires affecting Maui have unleashed chaos, especially at the airport as droves of people rush to flee the island.

Hawaiian Wildfires

Devastating wildfires on Maui have caused severe damage, primarily on the west side of the island in communities like Lahaina and Kaanapali.

In light of this tragedy, Hawai'i's Lieutenant Governor Sylvia Luke has issued an emergency proclamation discouraging all non-essential travel to Maui and extending the State of Emergency to all Hawaiian counties.

Visitors to Maui on non-essential travel are being asked to leave the island immediately, causing a massive rush at Kahului Airport.

Airline Response

Noticing the huge outflow of passengers from Kahului, airlines operating at the airport have responded to the dire situation in various ways.

Hawaiian Airlines released a statement saying that the Maui fires have not affected its operation at OGG. However, the carrier is offering travelers the opportunity to reschedule their flights for free.

Any passengers traveling on Hawaiian Airlines flights from Kahului between August 9 and 11 can reschedule their flights to new dates. Hawaiian says that any fare differences and change fees will be waived if certain criteria are met.

The first of these criteria is that the newly-rebooked tickets must be for the same booking class. For example, passengers who originally booked Main Cabin tickets must stay in Main Cabin whilst rebooking. 

Secondly, these tickets must be rebooked by August 18th, 2023 Hawaiian Standard Time and travel must commence by September 1st.

Southwest Airlines has been offering $19 inter-island flights, primarily marketed at those looking to leave Maui on an urgent basis and flee to neighboring islands.

Flight Operations

According to FlightAware, 17 inbound flights to Kahului Airport were canceled on Wednesday, August 9th: seven from American, six from United, and two apiece from Air Canada and WestJet.

However, given the immense demand to leave Maui right now, various airlines have ferried extra aircraft into the island to operate evacuation flights.

Earlier on Wednesday, American Airlines operated three A321neo jets into Maui on flights AA9787, AA9788, and AA9789.

The airline also up-gauged certain flights as part of the evacuation efforts. On Thursday, August 10th, Flight AA212 from LAX-OGG is being operated by a Boeing 777-200ER in place of the usual A321neo. This will ensure more passengers can be boarded onto the plane and evacuated from Maui.

Also as of August 9th, United Airlines has ferried in four aircraft to operate extra evacuation flights from OGG. Three of those were high-capacity 777-200's and the other was a 737 MAX 9.

On that same day, Delta Air Lines scheduled evacuation flights DL9891 and DL9892. The former, interestingly enough, flew to Honolulu while the latter was an additional service out to Los Angeles.

Air Canada also canceled its daily Vancouver-Kahului flights and has instead replaced them with extra services AC7050 and AC7067 that will serve to evacuate Canadians back home. The same goes for competitor WestJet, who have added flight WS4153 to Vancouver.

According to FlightRadar24, the vast majority of flights on Thursday, August 10th seem to be scheduled as normal. However, it is not outlandish to assume that more cancelations and disruptions will continue well into the weekend.

Hawaiian Airlines, Southwest, and Alaska have not added any extra flights into OGG, however, a few of the already-scheduled flights these airlines have from the airport have suffered from delays.

The Maui wildfire situation has only really affected operations at OGG Airport as of now. Other Hawaiian airports, such as nearby Kona International Airport (KOA) on the Big Island, have not reported any major disruptions.