What’s next in the ongoing saga of Hawaii reopening.
112 thoughts on “Why Airlines Just Pressed Pause on Hawaii Deals and Ramp-Up”
Comments are closed.
Home » Blog » Hawaii Travel Tips » Why Airlines Just Pressed Pause on Hawaii Deals and Ramp-Up
I’m sure hoping they change the 72 hour thing to 5 – 7 days. Our flight leaves on a monday. I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t get our results in time over the weekend. Ugh. We fly out of Seattle aug 24th
I would like to thank you for being so clear in your explanations in addressing our concerns. I’m sure all of us love Hawaii and want to keep it safe but we also want to have our vacations there as well. Just keep the updates coming and we will have to work with them.
Hi Cindy.
Thank you!
Aloha.
I think that visitors need to stay away unless they want to totally overwhelm Hawaii’s small infrastructure. We all love Hawaii and want to go. We need to understand that what we love about Hawaii would be totally destroyed if several million people suddenly showed up with C0VID and inundated the hospitals. Hawaiian hospitals would not be able to accommodate such a catastrophe. They are not designed for the kind of volume that would occur if C0VID cases increased dramatically. Better to respect the Governors wishes which are for the protection of the place we love and stay home until a vaccine is developed, or be prepared to isolate for 14 days if you must go. We need to be understanding and patient.
You are right, but too many people won’t exercise patience or self-control. We just got a dose of that this holiday weekend in San Diego. Beaches were closed in Orange County and LA County, because people there had refused to follow guidelines or respect others. So what happened? Huge numbers of “refugees” poured down into San Diego, plus more from Arizona (another hot spot). Beaches and parks were full of people from OC and LA and AZ (how could we tell? From license plates and license plate holders, plus total lack of local knowledge. They refused to wear masks, and they refused to keep physical distance. Now we will be facing a surge here in another couple of weeks. It’s sad, but there are simply too many people who don’t care. They help ruin things in their own area, then go elsewhere when the rules tighten up (due in part to their own behavior).
I feel for the people in Hawai’i who have/had tourism-related jobs but just letting people in isn’t the answer. Many other posters have noted the scientific impossibility of really knowing whether an arriving visitor is a carrier or not. Too many variables.
Maybe there needs to be some thinking outside the box. For example, Hyatt Hotels cash on hand for the quarter ending March 31, 2020 was $1.280 BILLION, a 104.8% increase year-over-year. Hilton Worldwide Holdings cash on hand for the quarter ending March 31, 2020 was $1.805B, a 291.54% increase year-over-year. Maybe these corporations, and others like them, could use some of those billions to help their loyal, underpaid employees who are now jobless through no fault of their own.
Aloha Debbie,
The “Governors wishes” are imploding our economy!!! How are other states who rely heavily on tourism handling it? I believe we can apply safety measures AND greet tourists at the same time. It just takes good leadership strategies working closely with qualified medical experts.
Hello, MP,
The factor you didn’t mention is compliance by tourists. The sad fact is, as we are seeing on the mainland, is that too many people think the rules don’t apply to them, or they just can’t be bothered. Result: no distancing, no masks, more cases of C-19, more hospitalizations, more deaths. This is one reason why medical experts are mostly recommending caution. You can’t blame the governor for that. And his “wish” (like all of us) would be to have everything normal. Unfortunately, C-19 doesn’t operate on wishes.
Aloha and hopefully we can welcome all of you/ My kids have been hre visiting from California. They got tests from Kaiser beore they left. results the next day, no questions asked, no symptoms. After being here for a week, my daughter in law thought she was getting some symptoms, andthe local Kaiseer tested her. She got her (negative) result the next day. So, tests are available, you just needto find out where in your area. I think most of our visitors would be willing to pay for a rapid test, which would be cheaperthan 14 days quar antine, and would allow those with less available vacation time to actually have their Hawaii vacation. As an artist whose inclome from local galleries has dropped to essentially zero, I personally hope that we can get healthy clinets back to buy art. My friends in the hospitality business are eqully hopeful.
Maybe in your state but not mine!
Thank you Beat of Hawaii for keeping us up to date about the travel situation and earlier about how life on Kauai has been.
This whole thing sounds like it will turn into a mess. Requiring a test 72 hours before departure seems risky enough since it still gives a few days to become infected. Extending it to 7 days would seem to be almost useless unless there was also a requirement for strict quar antine between test and travel time. And add to that the fact that you will have visitors that have followed the rules and have had a recent negative test against those visitors who haven’t and then are required to quarantine. How will anyone (such as car rental agencies) know whom to allow a car and whom not to allow a car?
I would think that ultimately the only real answer to keep residents safe would be the requirement of a recent negative test as a condition for staying on the island, say every three or four days. So as long as you’ve had a negative test within 72 to 96 hours you can be out and about. If not then you need to quarantine until you get a new negative test. After 2 or 3 weeks of negative tests then you no longer need to keep getting more tests. I suppose this would not be reasonable since people would balk at this and local test resources are scarce. I really hope that Hawaii doesn’t end up with a runaway epidemic come October.
Hi AW.
Thanks. Yes many questions remain.
Aloha.
Thank you for all the Information and updates. Sadly It is to complicated to fly to Maui or any of the islands at this time even if they change the testing time to five days prior to arrival. I was told
A “Rapid’ test in California could take as much as ten days!! So much for rapid.
With that in mind I cancelled my two week August 19th reservations for Maui this morning. 😥 Hopefully by next summer none of the restrictions will be in place.
Hi Donna.
Thanks.
Aloha.
Wow. Complicated to say the least
My question is what happens if you test positive on arrival? Where do you go? How long will you be there? Who will pay for it all? I can’t imagine any airline would transport you back to the mainland.
You have hit the nail on the head. People are so eager to try to get back to “normal” that they aren’t really thinking things through in detail. One rule of life (Murphy’s law): if something can go wrong, it will.
Aloha and mahaloh for your Hawaii blog. I think most of your readers/comments have been primarily from Californians (which makes sense, since they’re a big part of your vacationers). But what about folks like my wife and I traveling from the East Coast. Typically, we take 1 day to travel to CA, stay overnight and then fly Hawaii Air the next day non-stop to Lihue, Kauai. How would the timing of a C0VID-19 test work for us? Be tested on the East Coast and hope for results before leaving CA?
Hi Tom.
Thanks for your many comments. Your concerns make sense. If the period is extended from 3 to 5 or 7 days, that would help in your situation.
Aloha,
So in order to come to Hawaii and spend money / boost the economy / make memories and have fun, visitors are required to show results of a test. This is the misguided view of the State which is unfortunately only hurting the people of Hawaii.
If you arrive without a test, you get sent back or you quarantine until you can prove you are clear. Both actions raise the risks of blowing a vacation out of the water.
Placing pre-travel or arrival restrictions on visitors is never going to work, no matter how much the State tries to get folks to accept it. No one wants to gamble with their vacations.
Add to that, the number of people in your party increases both the risk and cost of traveling to Hawaii. It’s already not cheap, but now add $160 or more per person to the cost? No thanks.
It only takes one person in your party to fail their test to ruin a long anticipated trip to the islands. False positives are not uncommon. Who wants to take that chance?
Folks on the mainland have choices. We can drive to another state – no test required! We can even fly between states – still no test required!
Better to not spend any money in Hawaii until the State concedes that travel restrictions have to be dropped completely. Only then will airlines and travelers have the confidence to return.
Facts:
In Alaska and Maine, visitors are required to present a recent negative C0VID-19 test.
Fifteen states, meanwhile, require self-quarantines for incoming travelers: Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Maine, Nebraska, North Dakota, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island.
In addition, there are state and local rules about masks and distancing, which many visitors selfishly choose to ignore. Living as I do in a tourist area, I’d rather not see people come here to are just trying to avoid restrictions.
And no, people don’t do tourism to boost the economy; they do it for themselves. In any tourist area, that is painfully obvious.