Longer lines expected as interisland order lifted

Travelers should arrive early to go through new screening process

Interisland travelers should expect some redirection and longer lines at Kahului Airport as the state lifts the mandatory 14-day quarantine for interisland travelers today.

Maui County Managing Director Sandy Baz said Monday that those departing will now line up more toward the left side of the airport near baggage claim, rather than the ticket counters, to allow for more room and social distancing. Longer lines are expected with the new travel forms and screening process.

Officials will accept the forms and conduct temperature screenings prior to passengers going through TSA screening on the first floor, Baz said during the county's daily news conference. He advised people to arrive at the airport as early as two and a half to three hours ahead of their flight.

State Department of Transportation spokesman Tim Sakahara said via telephone from Oahu on Monday afternoon that both adults and children will need to have their own travel forms. He also advised that passengers download and fill out the forms prior to showing up at the airport, as they include questions about health conditions, such as when a person last received a flu shot. Forms may be filled out at the airport, but travelers may need to allow for more time.

Each time a person boards a plane, even if only for a day hop to another island, they will need to submit a new form and also go through temperature screening, Sakahara said. The forms should only be filled out within 24 hours of a flight, as health conditions may change.

Parents or guardians can fill out the forms for their children 17 years or younger and only need to include the child's name, date of birth and health information. Children traveling unaccompanied, however, must have fully completed forms filled out by a parent or guardian no more than 24 hours before the flight.

The form can be found at health.hawaii.gov/travel/.

Hawaii residents traveling interisland have been subject to a 14-day quarantine since the governor's order went into effect April 1.

Gov. David Ige said during his Monday afternoon news conference that it was "safe to travel between islands" and that it was time for family and friends to visit one another again.

The lifting of the quarantine comes as Oahu saw two consecutive days of "relatively high coronavirus case numbers," including 15 on Friday and 17 on Saturday. Ige said an increase in cases was expected as businesses and activities reopened across the state, and that Hawaii still has the lowest COVID-19 numbers in the nation.

On Monday, there were eight new cases reported, all on Oahu. The statewide total is now 736, including 501 on Oahu, 120 in Maui County, 82 on Hawaii island and 21 on Kauai. Twelve residents have been diagnosed out of state. There have been 17 deaths statewide.

Dr. Bruce Anderson, director of the state Department of Health, said during the state news conference that among the new reported cases are three related to a low-income housing facility. Two people are related and the other case is a person in the "vicinity."

He also reported that a patient that had been at the Hale Nani Rehabilitation and Nursing Center on Oahu had tested positive. DOH is investigating if the patient had been infected prior to entering the facility. He said the patient's COVID-19 test was negative when they were first admitted, but they were later taken to the hospital with COVID-19 symptoms.

Prior to the patient, an employee also had a positive test but did not work while ill and self-isolated. The infection source was in the community and not at the hospital, DOH said.

Active monitoring and testing is ongoing as well as safety measures and procedures at the facility.

Anderson said Hawaii's hospitals have the capacity to treat COVID-19 patients and that hospitals may be well under capacity as people are putting off certain types of medical care out of fear. He urged those that need care to not be afraid to receive it.

As interisland travel resumes without quarantine today, Sakahara said the biggest change will be the new travel forms, which the DOT expects will take maybe two to five minutes to go over with each passenger. Temperature checks aren't new, and those with a temperature of more than 100.4 degrees will not be able to fly.

The form asks questions such as whether the traveler has taken any fever-reducing medicine or if they have had symptoms such as fever or chills. Sakahara said that answering yes to the questions may not automatically mean a person cannot fly, but they will undergo more screening that could involve a COVID-19 test.

"The passenger would get the nasal swab sample at the airport and it would be taken to a DOH lab for testing," he explained. "The passenger may still be able to fly, unless they have a fever."

If the test comes back positive, which could take 24 to 48 hours, the DOH will have the person's health and contact information for a follow up.

Sakahara, who's spoken to different agencies that have been waiting for the interisland quarantine to be lifted, said there is also an expected uptick in interisland bookings.

Southwest Airlines spokesman Brad Hawkins said that airlines are not permitted to speak in "real time" about pricing and bookings but said that "I can tell you, generally, that we're seeing positive response to our Southwest Promise," a commitment made by the airline to implement changes in cleaning and safety practices.

"We know the confidence to travel among the islands will be predicated on how safe and how comfortable travelers feel," Hawkins said via email. "We're ready to welcome them aboard!"

Hawaiian Airlines also did not disclose whether there has been an increase in bookings with the lifted quarantine, but reiterated that beginning today, it will be increasing its base schedule of five daily round trips between Kahului and Honolulu to 11 daily round trips.

Meanwhile, the 'Ohana by Hawaiian flights will increase from two to three daily round trips between Honolulu and Molokai and Lanai.

The airline also confirmed that it is blocking middle seats and has capped its load factors at 70 percent.

Passengers who are unable to fly once they arrive at the airport and wish to change their scheduled flight can do so without a change fee if their ticket was purchased between March 1 and June 30, 2020. For passengers who choose to cancel the trip and not rebook the same itinerary, the unused value of the ticket may be applied as a travel credit toward the purchase of a new ticket for a period of up to two years from the original ticket issuance date.

As for the lifting of the trans-Pacific passenger quarantine, Ige said, "we are working on a timeline. We want to get it done as soon as possible."

"August would probably be more realistic. If we can get it done in July, we will get it done in July," Ige said.

He said the process is complicated, as there will be a mix of passengers at the airport, including interisland travelers who no longer need quarantine and other travelers who still may need to be quarantined.

On Sunday, there were two trans-Pacific flights to Maui, bringing a total of 109 people, including 40 visitors, 47 returning residents, 10 people relocating to Hawaii and 12 crew.

* Melissa Tanji can be reached at mtanji@mauinews.com.