Airport Delays

[terracore]

Well, congratulations!

You all have convinced me that the Hilo Airport is just to "rinky-dinky" and "itsy-bitsy" to serve any purpose beyond what it currently is!

At any event, it can be here in the event of a dire emergency.

Remember TWA 235?

Hilo can handle most of the air traffic if Kona had an extended outage.  Over half the airport is currently mothballed but they still service the escalators, elevators, and baggage handling systems in the ghost part of the airport.  I don't know how long it would take TSA to add additional checkpoints but the equipment required to service larger aircraft could start arriving quickly if needed.  I don't know if there are any facilities to handle international passengers or if the old hardstands they used to park the heavy aircraft from Hilo's glory days are still useable and obviously the parking situation would need to be addressed.  I've seen the old abandoned parking lots between the airport and Leilani Ave.  They're old but look useable.  I think the old parking lots on the other side of the airport got fenced in when they expanded the perimeter fence and they cut down that big beautiful old banyan tree. They tore down all the old cargo buildings a few years ago along with the old terminal building (across the street from the pool), so the air cargo would need a temporary solution, but the footprint of the airport has the space.  Probably half the new cargo building is vacant or being used for storage, so some of that could be ramped up immediately.  I haven't seen the commuter terminal in a few years but last I saw it was mostly empty.

A friend of ours works for the bus company (Roberts). They don't have enough drivers and the ones they do have are working overtime.  So bussing the pax from Hilo to Kona isn't as easy as it sounds.  The buses might be available, but the drivers might not be.  Imagine the irony if they had to fly bus drivers in from the other islands.

At one point both Aloha and Hawaiian Airlines had passenger service to the Waimea airport.  I don't know what type of aircraft can land there now.  I've only been there once or twice, it's like a ghost airport.  Well maintained but nothing happening.   Mokulele has a few flights per day to Kahului.  If Kona did have an extended closure some of the smaller aircraft at least could be diverted there.