New flight being added to meet the demand for service from Kamuela which has exceeded EAS expectations.
KAILUA-KONA, HAWAII – Mokulele Airlines has announced that it is expanding its service between Kamuela-Waimea on the Big Island and Kahului, Maui by adding a third daily roundtrip flight to meet growing demand. Mokulele began offering service form Kamuela in September 2013 after being awarded the Essential Air Service (EAS) contract from the Hawaii Department of Transportation. EAS is a government program designed to help ensure that smaller communities have access to commercial air service.
“Since winning the award, we’ve focused on delivering low fare, high-quality flights to the community by working directly with those who would use our service, and our boardings have reflected that,” explains Mokulele’s President and CEO Ron Hansen. Since Mokulele initiated the service, air traffic has grown more in Kamuela than in any other EAS market in the past two years. Mokulele expects to fly over 12,000 passengers in its first year of operation from Kamuela, compared to approximately 50 flown by the previous operator over a similar time period.
Mokulele will now offer 42 weekly flights between the two destinations, only 24 of which are subsidized by the EAS program. “The EAS program can truly help small communities when partnered with the right operator,” Hansen adds. “Because of the EAS program, we’re now able to increase flights, and hopefully grow Kamuela off of the EAS subsidy program by the end of our four-year agreement. We’re doing whatever it takes to build traffic to the point the market is 100 percent self-sustaining and no longer dependent on federal dollars.”
With the new flights, passengers can depart from Kahului at 8:35 am and arrive in Kamuela at 9:20 am. Maui-bound passengers can depart Kamuela at 9:40 am and arrive in Kahului at 10:25 am.
Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.
