A mechanical glitch led a Hawaiian Airlines flight with 300 people aboard to safely make an emergency landing at Los Angeles International Airport on Monday — the Honolulu-based carrier’s third emergency landing in a three-week period.
The diverted landings, which Hawaiian Airlines officials stress were unrelated in cause, might prompt more scrutiny of the company’s operations by the Federal Aviation Administration. However, the regulatory body isn’t confirming whether it will pursue such action.
In Hawaiian’s latest unplanned landing Monday, a cockpit warning light indicated that the Honolulu-bound plane had an open fuel jettison valve. That prompted the pilot to circle the Airbus 330-200 to burn off fuel and then return to the Los Angeles airport about 40 minutes after leaving, officials said.
When workers on the ground later inspected the craft, they found that the fuel valve was closed after all, Hawaiian representatives said.
"The cornerstone of our maintenance program is to err on the side of passenger and crew safety," the airline said of the pilot’s actions in a statement released Monday.
Prior to the takeoff and emergency landing, the passengers aboard Hawaiian Airlines Flight 3 had already been delayed for more than two hours when ground crews apparently caused an accidental fuel spill from the same plane at the airport gate, according to Hawaiian Airlines spokeswoman Alison Coyle.
"There is currently no evidence" that the fuel spill and the faulty indicator light were related, Coyle added in an email.
Los Angeles television stations showed live feeds of the plane descending east over the city before turning west and landing at LAX at 2:22 p.m. Pacific time. A full complement of firefighters waited for the plane at the runway, according to local fire department officials.
"We were in close communication with Hawaiian Airlines about the return of Flight 3 to LAX," FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said in an email Monday. "We were satisfied with the airline’s explanation of what occurred."
The flight eventually left again for Honolulu at about 4:30 p.m.
It arrived at about 7:20 p.m.
Scott Meehan of Waikiki calmly walked through the baggage claim area after the flight landed at Honolulu Airport. "I’m fine," Meehan said.
He said the pilot and flight attendants took good care of the passengers. "They were transparent, kept us informed," said Meehan, art director of the television show "Hawaii Five-0."
When they returned to Los Angeles, about half the passengers apparently chose to take another flight, he said. Hawaiian Airlines offered customers the option of taking a different flight to Honolulu.
As they waited for their baggage, Jen Capizzo of Orange County, Calif., who was traveling with husband Franco and 5-year-old son Evan, said, "We’re glad we’re here safely."
When the pilot announced they had to return to LAX about 30 minutes into the flight because of a problem, Jen Capizzo said, "We were really scared."
Franco Capizzo said, "The pilot did a good job of being calm and keeping us calm."
On May 12 a Hawaiian Airlines flight headed from Honolulu to Kailua-Kona made an emergency landing on Maui when one of its two engines malfunctioned. An engine of the Boeing 717 was smoking when it landed at Kahului Airport. There were no injuries.
Two weeks earlier, on May 1, a Hawaiian Airlines Boeing 767-300 jet carrying 224 passengers and 10 crew on a flight to Oakland, Calif., returned to Maui and made an emergency landing after an odor of fumes was detected in the cabin. Two people suffered minor injuries when passengers evacuated on emergency slides. The problem was blamed on equipment that controls air pressure and recycles air.
Despite the issues, Hawaiian conducts a "rigorous safety program" and the company is "confident in the maintenance program that we have," Coyle said. She added that a "message problem" prompted Monday’s emergency landing, not a maintenance issue.
Gregor said the FAA will generally take a closer look at an airline’s operations anytime it experiences multiple incidents within a fairly short period of time.
He declined to say whether the FAA would specifically scrutinize Hawaiian’s operations because the FAA doesn’t discuss surveillance activities for individual operators.
