A Western Airlines’ jetliner will touch down in Honolulu at 12:45 tomorrow to blaze the trail for the new transpacific air route victors.
It will be a jubilant moment for Western — which first won a Hawaii route in 1960 and then promptly lost it under Presidential veto — as well as the State of Hawaii.
“We were geared up and ready to go at a moment’s notice,” said Allen Hoss, director of sales in the Pacific for Western. “After waiting so long, we wanted to get here as soon as possible.”
Western will fly two daily round-trips until next Thursday, when the airline will shift to its full schedule of 34 flights a week, including the historic first non-stop service between Hawaii and Alaska, San Diego and Oakland.
United Air Lines will inaugurate daily non-stop flights between Honolulu and Chicago on Aug. 1, announced L.E. Perry, vice president of the Pacific and Orient for UAL.
Other airline executives, huddling in the wake of this week’s surprise route awards, were expected to release new Hawaii airline schedules within days.
“We will announce no later than Monday the date on which Continental Airlines will start service,” said Charles G. Braden, vice president-
Pacific, who is elated after a stormy year of route proceedings.
Although rejected for a South Pacific route, Continental swept the domestic field with rights to serve Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, Ontario, Long Beach, Phoenix, Denver, Kansas City, Houston and Chicago.
“The problem that Continental faces is our heavy commitment to the military contract flights, nine Boeing 707-320s flying 136 flights a month between the Mainland and Southeast Asia,” said Braden.
He said those aircraft were assigned to transpacific passenger service March 5 but were deployed to the MAC program due to the repeated postponements in the route investigation. …
Asked who will be on board Western’s first flight tomorrow, Hoss quipped: “We’re going to go out and beat the bushes to get people.”
Every Sunday, “Back in the Day” looks at an article that ran on this date in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. The items are verbatim, so don’t blame us today for yesteryear’s bad grammar.
