Honolulu Airport 1972-79

Honolulu Airport 1972 - 1979	Bob Bogash

Home Safety Index Reader Comments Contact

Western in the 707 days

From 1972 until 1979, I was the Boeing Field Service Engineer/Representative at Honolulu International Airport (HNL). My primary duties were to support the Boeing 737 fleet operated by Aloha Airlines. I had an office in their hangar, and have a separate web page devoted to their operations. My secondary responsibility was to support all other Boeing operations in Honolulu. Primarily, these involved supporting 747 transit operations conducted by numerous international airlines. There were up to 50 747 flights a day transiting HNL. It was a very busy operation, often with 10-15 747s on the ground at any one time. (I also supported other Boeing operations, including military, helicopters, and for 3 years Boeing hydrofoil boats that operated between the Islands. That story on another webpage.)

Pan Am - first to HNL in 1935

With a Boeing marked van and other vehicles, I had access to all ramp areas. I also had access to taxiway and runway locations on many occasions. For an avid airplane photographer, this was a dream come true! HNL was fairly unique in that it was thousands of miles from any other land, and almost all flights crossing the Pacific made fuel stops there. Ferry flights. Charters. There were not many alternative airports, unlike many other major locations - like NYC, Paris and London. It is also a Joint-use airport with Hickam AFB, and so the full population of military flights also transited - from U-2s to F-4s to Navy B-47s! (No typo; had 3 of them there.)

Sadly, many of the airlines shown are no longer in existence - including Aloha. This makes the photos all the more historic.

From my office in the Aloha hangar.

HNL was a very exotic and picturesque airport at the time with nice central gardens, and open air concourses.

Bob Bogash - the author and photographer - in the HNL central garden - May 1976

A busy place!

Finals for Runway 4R with the then new Reef Runway 8R in the foreground.

Short Final for Runway 4R.
Aloha's average flight time was 19 minutes and their airplanes averaged 20 flights/day.

Me and my trusty Boeing van alongside Runway 8R monitoring take-off parameters.
The "Techs" were monitoring the data - I was taking great pictures!

The following are some of my numerous photos taken during that time period. By way of my limited time, most are not identified as to Tail Numbers, Dates, etc, but some do have some notes attached. I have the detailed info should some one want more details and also much higher resolution copies of the photos.

The usual crowd - Inter-Island

Aloha and Hawaiian

In the 1970s when I was based in Hawaii, all travel to Hawaii arrived at Honolulu Intl (HNL) with travel to the outer islands conducted by Aloha and Hawaiian Airlines. Hawaiian, founded in 1929, operated DC-3s, then Convair 340/440s, and finally DC-9s. Aloha, founded in 1946, flew DC-3s, then F-27s and Viscounts, BAC-111s, and finally Boeing 737s. Aloha and Hawaiian shared the same hangar at HNL.

In later years, when ETOPS became available for Twins, Aloha expanded HNL flights to Mainland cities. Hawaiian expanded with larger equipment - DC-8s, then DC-10s, Tristars, 767s and A330s. After Aloha went out of business, other carriers - such as Alaska - began using 737s to the Islands.

Along the way, Aloha began expanding the city pairs to include direct flights to some of the outer Islands, to be followed by mainstream large carriers. Ultimately, Hawaii's main airport at HNL ceased to be the arrival point for many tourists and the Inter-Island business suffered, perhaps leading to Aloha's failure in 2008.

Here's another one of my HNL responsibilities:
Air Micronesia, nick-named Air Mike; operated by Continental.
Maintenance by Aloha.
They flew between HNL and Guam stopping at all the small islands in-between.
Spent many hours and days working on those 727s! Lotsa corrosion.
From Nordair gravel strips in the Arctic to unpaved coral strips in the South Pacific.
I've had an interesting life.

Sitting alongside the Reef Runway - 8R - I'm in Heaven!

These were Boeing Rolls-Royce Hot weather tests I arranged for HNL
Paul Bennett (Pablo) was the pilot

I like this one - PWA 320B - so I show it twice!

The First airline flying between the Mainland and Hawaii

The New Era - Wide-bodies

Pan Am started Hawaii service in the 1930s using Martin M-130 and Boeing 314 flying boats.
After the War, and through the 1950s, piston engine DC-4/6/7, Constellation, and Stratocruiser equipment was the norm.
Starting in 1959, Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8 were the airplanes flying to Hawaii. See photos below.
Starting in 1970, the wide-body Boeing 747 began to take over, becoming the dominant airplane, later supplemented by the DC-10.

During my stay in Hawaii, the airfield was so covered with 747s that the locals use to joke that Oahu was going to sink under the weight of all those 747s.

When Boeing introduced the 747, they created a "Meet and Greet" program guaranteeing a Boeing Field Service Engineer would meet every arrival. I did this in Montreal with Air France, and again in HNL. The meets were only supposed to last a limited time - maybe a year - but with Qantas, they sort of guaranteed "forever." So I had to meet ALL Qantas flights.

Qantas operated their 747s from Sydney to San Francisco with stops in Nandi and Honolulu. The flights operated 4 days a week - M-W-F-Sat. The airplane arrived eastbound headed for SFO at about 1100 hrs and transited on the return to Australia at about 2300 (11 PM). Each transit lasted about an hour. That meant only 3 of the 8 transits were during "regular business hours." The rest were late at night or on the weekend. The drive to the airport took about an hour. Being a Rep in Honolulu is so glamorous! Just lying on the beach at Waikiki sipping Mai Tai's and watching the bikini's walk by.

I quickly learned that "Meeting" the flight - which entailed talking to the crew and checking for problems - was NOT a "Greet" only situation. After a few times where I merely "met" the arrival and departed, I got bit in the butt when the airplane developed a problem during the transit, and I had left for home. Worse yet, some suffered ATB's (Air Turn Backs) after departure. So "Meeting" the flight meant meeting the flight, standing by during the whole transit, and then "hanging around" for about half hour after take-off (to ensure it didn't come back.) The evening flights meant leaving home about 10 PM and getting back home about 2 AM. I did that for six years, meaning about 2500 QF Meet and Greets!

Although I didn't have to meet all the other operator's flights, I did meet most of them. Each arrival entailed logging the event along with the problems if any. Looking at my Activity Log, I note that I met about 75,000 747 arrivals over a 6-7 year period!!!

On 24 May 1972, my wife Dot and I flew this airplane - N4723U - from SFO to HNL on the last leg of our epic move from Montreal to Hawaii. We rode in the first row on the right side in First Class and I still vividly remember our first view of the Islands, Waikiki, and Diamond Head. It was very exciting!

The airplane was named the William A. Patterson after the long-time President of United.

On 28 December 1997, this airplane was involved in a Clear Air Turbulence incident flying from Tokyo-Narita to HNL. One passenger died as a result of the incident (making the Incident into an Accident.) The cabin interior was severely damaged as well. Since the airplane was destined to be retired shortly thereafter, United ferried the airplane to Las Vegas where it was placed in storage. Subsequently, it was parted out and scrapped. By an amazing twist of fate, in 2007, I wound up with the cockpit and much of its equipment. It was stored at the Museum of Flight's Paine Field Everett facility. Eventually, the Museum decided they didn't want it, so I sold it to a collector in Iowa, but I still have some of the cockpit items, including the I.D. plate.

It was configured to carry 450 passengers

Here's a sistership - N4727U - I also photographed in HNL

A 747 "Non-freighter" Freighter

Even airlines with tiny 747 fleets - like American (with 2, I believe) and Braniff (with one) flew them to HNL.

The "Pumpkin" was the most famous airplane in Honolulu. N601BN was Braniff's daily flight with their (at the time) only 747 - which flew a daily round-trip from Dallas to HNL. Altho not the oldest airplane in the fleet (by far), it was the high time airplane - the first to pass 50,000 flying hours. It achieved that feat by spending about 17 hours/day in the air.

It arrived every day about 5:00 PM and departed about 6:00 PM. Especially before the reef runway was built, departures off runway 8 took flights cruising leisurely past Waikiki, low and slow, where all the locals and tourists were just sitting down enjoying their first Mai Tai - and watching the Pumpkin heading back to Texas.

I took that flight myself from Dallas to HNL on October 1, 1976

In November 1973, I spent a month assigned to this airplane.
We flew from Travis AFB near San Francisco to Hickam Field in HNL, Andersen AFB on Guam, and Clark Field near Manila in the Philippines.
Boeing agreed to "provide the services of a Loadmaster" (the airplane was flying USAF cargo in freighter configuration during the Israeli Yom Kippur War. USAF had moved their assets to the Middle East to support the war.)
... and I was designated the Loadmaster. Even though I knew nothing about loading or unloading the airplane and it was my first experience with a 747 Freighter.
I can tell you - that after a month, I was "Qualified" and knew a whole lot about operating that airplane!!!
Just needed a little O.J.T. I've a whole webpage coming (someday) on that gig.

Air Siam operated two 747s under wet lease from Aer Lingus

Later they added a DC-10-30

Some non-747 Wide-bodies

Here's an interesting one - a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar on a World Sales Tour

Lockheed had leased this airplane from PSA - before or after Delivery is unknown.
It had the usual logos of the Tristar customers.
It also had one additional unique PSA feature (unique - I believe) - it had an airstair - an airstair that led to the forward belly, which in turn led to a set of stairs to the main cabin deck.

The Narrow-body World

Remember 707s and DC-8s?
Yep, those were the days, my friend, we thought they'd never end....

...even a 720B

727 anyone?

VC-10 too!

Viet Nam War days - lotsa non-standard traffic heading to and from the War Zone

This was Jack Lord and company filming a Hawaii 5-0 episode

A lot of smaller (less reliable?) carriers - who also had poor credit.

Like Air Manila here. The Capt carried around a suitcase full of cash to pay the bills.
Like for fuel. Hey! I've done that myself flying around remote parts of the world in Boeing airplanes!

An old "straight-pipe" 707-320

After paying cash for a fuel load, this airplane took off, and suffered a mechanical problem. They had to dump all the (newly purchased) fuel and return. After working on the airplane, the pilot had to buy another load of fuel (with cash, of course.) He was very unhappy.

He was even more unhappy when after his second take-off, he had more mechanical problems and had to return again (ATB - Air Turn Back) - dumping yet another load of fuel. Meanwhile, the Shell fuel truck driver needed a Brinks armored car to hold all the cash the pilot kept forking over to him.

After two ATB's, the Capt was so mad he could spit nails - mostly in my direction. One of the joys of representing the Boeing Company out there in the Real World. My boss, Andy Jones, never told me about those situations. And, I have lots mores stories about unhappy pilots and unhappy passengers.
I was thankful he didn't come back for a third time....

An Invasion of Canadian and European carriers on Charters

My old airline Nordair from Montreal with a Stretch 8. I spent 4 years with Nordair.

Transair from Winnipeg

and Quebecair - also from Montreal

Here are a couple of strangers

The Brits are coming, the Brits are coming

Some "Boon-doggling" government trips

Note that none of these government airplanes used the military facilities at Hickam AFB

The FAA had a hangar and maintenance facility at HNL

Ferry and Delivery Flights

Travel Clubs

This 707 was one of several operated by International out of Boeing Field in Seattle.
One day, on landing at HNL, the nose landing gear outer cylinder fractured and the inner cylinder, axle and wheels broke off and tumbled beneath the airplane damaging the fuselage extensively. I participated in devising a temporary repair that enabled the airplane to be ferry flown back to Boeing Field for a permanent repair by Boeing. Quite a story deserving of a webpage by itself!

Piston and Odd Charters

Air Distribution was a start-up company in HNL that was intended to fly cargo between the Islands at night. They bought and fixed up 3 C-54 (DC-4) airplanes for the purpose - they were beautiful. But, they ran out of money before they flew their first flight. I bought a bunch of stuff at their bankruptcy auction, including a big metal desk which I now use for my ham radio station. I also have a DC-4 NLG retract actuator with a Serviceable Tag on it, should anyone want to make me an offer.

The Budweiser Clydesdales arrive in Hawaii on board a TIA DC-8 freighter!

Military

HNL is a Joint-Use airport with the commercial side sharing the facilities with Hickam AFB

Honolulu, Waikiki, and Diamond Head in the background

Oooh - VIP's!
They musta jammed my lens focus

The Viet Nam War was still underway and there were lots of airplanes heading to and from the War Zone.

With a little AB for noise ambiance

Wow - well, this was a few years ago!

Special C-130s would go out with this big fork on the nose and capture film canisters floating down after being ejected from spy satellites.

Historical Note: The following airlines shown in this photo essay all have one thing in common: They no longer exist.

Aloha, Northwest, Pan Am, TWA, Continental, Braniff, Swissair, Pacific Western, CP Air, Nordair, Quebecair, Transair, Wardair, Monarch, British Airtours, Laker, DanAir, B. Caledonian, Freelandia, Air Siam, World, Trans International, UTA, Air Manila, Reeve Aleutian, Air Distribution, Ambassadair, Aeronauts, Nomads, Airlift, and Ranger.

707s, DC-8s, VC-10s, 727s, DC-10s, Tristars, and almost all pax 747s are also no longer in service.

Some more airport photo pages:

LAX

LaGuardia