By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 21, 2008
Sadly, this isn’t a needle in a haystack case. Many airlines are just holding on. I was suprised about this airline. I always thought the hawaiian airlines weren’t struggling. I think we need to see either mergers or higher ticket prices for the good of the airline industry.
Sounds like a job for Southwest to go in there and make it profitable. I can see Alaska doing it but not sure they have the loot to make it work.
Or Hawaiian buying them out.
http://www.alohaairlines.com/home/home.php
No Flights as of March 31st 2008 ending 61 years of service.
The shutdown of Aloha’s passenger operations will affect about 1,900 employees. Aloha also announced that its air cargo and aviation services units will continue to operate as usual while the U.S. Bankruptcy Court seeks bids from potential buyers. On March 27, 2008, Saltchuk Resources, Inc., announced its intention to buy Aloha’s air cargo business.
I can’t believe they wouldn’t try to fight bankruptcy. I guess Hawaii might see a monopoly develop. Of course, there is still the evil GO.
At least part of Aloha is continuing to operate. Perhaps eventually the passenger side will get started again.
Aloha handled customer service and ramp for USAir, which they will no longer be doing. USAir has already sent csr’s and rampers to all of their stations in Hawaii. Apparently, you had to have pretty high seniority in PHX to get the transfer.
Oh, man! Seriously, I just sold my Hawaiian Air stock last month.
Dang 
I’m feeling sleepy all the sudden…
I will miss aloha and all their 737-200 noisemakers. While I never flew them I always enjoyed watching them hop all day long. I still remember my first time without my dad taking me to HNL. I was on my honeymoon and we were headed to OGG so we had to wait about 5 hours at the airport for a Delta L1011 to carry us on to maui. My new wife and I sat there and watched the 10 or so Hawaiian and Aloha flights go in the meantime. I vowed not to ever let THAT happen again. Of course sitting in First Class made up for it (haha). Way back when Delta did not fly direct to maui. At least thats what it took for us to fly there in First with bulkhead seats. I was there again when Go! announced their intention to operate and the locals were very upset that this very event might happen back in 2006. Maybe as others have suggested another airline will grab the name and continue the much needed service. Its one of those airline names that will always bring excellent memories to me. Too bad also as we are planning to take the kids with us next year and I wanted to take my son on a 737-200 and let him hear the roar.
Is it possible that NO business model in a deregulated airline environment will ever work in the Hawaiian market? History shows that two carriers can barely make it and three carriers mean inevitable bankruptcy for at least one of the carriers.
And, when essentially a Hawaiian-only carrier moves into the highly competitive mainlaind-Hawaii service, what is the likely result? Is it that a competitive Hawaii-interisand service in never going to be profitable, or is it only when the Hawaii carrier branches out to the mainland that the downward spiral begins?
Is there a solution? Re-regulation? Southwest Airlines taking over the entire market and essentially running a benevolent monopoly? Anything about competition, or the lack thereof, in the Alaskan market that might offer something useful?
blogs.usatoday.com/sky/2008/03/aloha.html?csp=34
It looks like this was a case of not just fuel pricing and fare wars, but that Mesa went in with deep pockets and proprietary information and shut down Aloha. A lot of non-revs are going to be unhappy, because it used to be that you would fly your carrier into any station in Hawaii, and then buy a super cheap inter-island ticket to get where you needed to be. The inter-island airfare was way cheaper than even the ferries because of the fare war.
One of the problems with the inter-island market is that people want jets but the routes do not justify jet service. The ATR72 or Q400 would be ideal for the routes. The time difference between a Q400 and a jet is not that much, even on the longest route.
One of these days, the general public will hopefully learn that modern turboprops are not bad.
You think that the Q400 is a vastly cheaper to operate aicraft, however, it’s really not.
Its CASM and TOC is only slightly cheaper than the CRJ700. It’s TOC is actually HIGHER than the CRJ-200 and it’s CASM not drastically lower. Its acquisition cost is lower than a new CRJ700, but with the glut of 50 seat RJ’s hitting the market, it’s probably more expensive than a used CRJ-100 or -200.
Didn’t realize that. Is that an “ideal” range where its costs would be better than a CRJ700 or similar?
Do you have a source?
My source is Bombardier - bombardier.com/en/0_0/0_0_1_ … 7_CSFB.pdf
It’s a PDF file, go to page 21. It’ll take awhile to figure out what everything is on it and everything is based on a 500 nm segment length (if it wasn’t the graphic would be 3D and virtually impossible to understand), but it’s a really cool piece of information.
Also, see page 25 where you can see a 200NM segment where the Q400 does make more sense.
…and Honolulu to Hilo is 187NM.
yeah, for Hilo and Kona a Q400 probably does make some sense, although lined up against Hawaiian 717’s I don’t know who’d book you unless you significantly undercut them.
The market needs a true modern 100-120 seat aircraft, as outlined in the latter pages of that document.