Lack of gates, no MX hangar, and a 175 seat ETOPS aircraft doing 40 min block/30 min turns. The barriers to entry are pretty costly.

Interisland is a low margin profit area. The bulk of profits probably come from cargo. The ROI to build a new cargo facility, I would guess, is pretty poor.

You're not from Hawaii are you?

No. Many of us were watching our own airlines juggle with bankruptcy threats and pushing off concession threats. Unless you are one of those guys that got hired at HA at the age of 21 in the 80's or 90's, 9/11 screwed ALL OF US. Diapers my @$$.

Now, if you are one of the more junior guys or gals that got furloughed or bumped out of the left seat once or even twice... While those guys that got hired at HA at the age of 21 in the 80's or 90's picked up gobs of open time, then I feel your pain. We will overcome. Again.

Hopefully MGT has a plan. I will not vote for ANY concessions regardless of the threat. I know that's been the mantra of the past. This isn't my first airline. I hope it's my retirement place, but if it's not meant to be, I'll move and apply elsewhere.
SWA... Whatever. With no Aloha or Island Air, there's room. Now, good luck finding gate space. Your new terminal will only take 25 years to get built.

+1. I'm no SWA pilot (nor am I a fan) but I'm familiar with their history and business model. SWA's operations in parts of the mainland are predicated on high cycles and quick turns, as fast as HA's interisland. They've been doing this in California and Texas for decades, and doing it well. They will flood the market in Hawaii and they will probably lose money at first (and also experience logistics problems), but they can afford to do this. SWA has done this before, including in Seattle with AS. Whether SWA succeeds or not on the islands isn't going to be determined by how fast they can turn a 737. It'll be more by qualitative factors like hometown loyalty, gate space and HA's reaction.

Aloha HA - I apologize if I'm stepping where I don't belong, but if you don't mind the ramblings of a WN guy, please read on. First, I honestly don't think you guys have anything to worry about. I've been at WN a little over 25 years and feel I know our strengths and weaknesses pretty well. You guys have an amazing product with solid brand identity and loyalty. We have a propensity to enter a new arena acting like we know everything - and won't listen to outside advice or opinions. This strongly works in your favor - especially in a market like HI. Additionally, your product and service exudes aloha, where ours exudes, well, yee-ha. The Big Brains of Dallas have stated we won't enter into inter-island for at least a year after service starts - and even then I suspect it will only be baby steps. Without a dedicated subfleet over there (something I don't see us ever doing), our inter-island will likely be a handful of daily flights between key points. Competition? Sure. But not enough to cause any major loss. Ironically, the folks riding on us inter-island will probably just be the ones we brought over to begin with - extra pax via newly generated traffic.

Herb used to say the new 737's he bought came from Boeing with passengers already in them. My strong suspicion is that will be true for the Hawai'i market as well, and there will be plenty to go around for all of us.

That's just one fool's opinion, from a guy who loves HA and has always been grateful for your hospitality.

Well said. That's one of the best posts I've ever read on this forum.

Just a few points of reference from the Company’s mouth:

- 20-30 aircraft dedicated to the HI operation “eventually”

- DEN-HI with the 7MAX as that will have the range. They’re actually pretty excited about that jet because of its range as it will allow SWA to open up new routes such as the one I just mentioned and also Florida to deep(er) S. America.

There was never any mention made of it but I can see the possibility of them ferrying a few 143 seat -700s over Part 91 to do the inter-island. I’m not assuming per se that inter-island will be done via the -800s or MAX 8s.

Either way I wish us ALL success.

Interesting info, thanks.

The -700 interisland would make more sense. Might be fun for you WN guys to have a mini base in HNL!

I’ve always wondered why AS doesn’t do any interisland legs. They have the gates and certainly enough aircraft scattered around the islands. They will probably feel the effects of WN entering the market the most, as they have the greatest number of west coast to Hawaii flights currently.

Alaska is the main target in this move. WN has been connecting pax to Alaska island flights for a long time. WN has also been in a battle with AK for west coast customers for the last year or so.
Inter island, if it ever comes about, will mainly SWA pax. As was mentioned above, WN doesn’t have the aircraft fleet or gates to make it work like Hawaiian. I highly doubt Hawaiian will feel much of an effect at all.
The key to this whole move was Andrew Watterson. Southwest poached him from Hawaiian about 2 years ago and he runs network planning. He knows the ins/outs and strengths/weaknesses of how Hawaiian operates. Hawaiian has the whole enchilada. They have the fleet and the know how and real estate/political connections to bring long haul pax to the islands and shuffle them around. Nobody will be able to mimic that with 737s.

My... how quickly people forget. Anyone remember Mesa coming in with 4 50-seat regional jets? The kama'aina were ecstatic that someone was coming in from the mainland to put a hurting on the "big, bad local airlines who were gouging local passengers." Hawaiian happily matched them interisland, even beyond Mesa's capacity, and that match was the "final push" to put Aloha out of business (the third largest employer in the state). Mesa left literally 5 years after Aloha said aloha, and now Hawaiian as the big winner is charging a pretty penny for their fares, charging baggage fees, and has the interisland market all to themselves. Kama'aina loyalty to Hawaiian Air? That's funny. People are only loyal to their bottom dollar if the service is on par... i.e. safe, reliable and on time.

I also wouldn't be so blasé about Southwest coming into the market either... Unlike other start-ups like Mahalo or MidPac or mainland ventures like Mesa's go!, this is a 1000-lbs gorilla that made its name doing quick turns and serving smaller airports coming into the market with the number of aircraft dedicated to the operation exceeding the size of Aloha Airlines at its peak.

Having said that... it'll be interesting to see this whole thing unfold. Personally, I think this is gonna be putting more hurt on Alaska than Hawaiian, at least until interisland spools up, but we'll see.