Travelers checking in for Hawaiian Air’s flight to Honolulu tonight will be asked if they want to volunteer to be weighed with their carry-on luggage.
The same invitation was extended to passengers flying here on tonight’s flight from Honolulu.
This is for a weight survey to help ensure accuracy in the weight and balance of aircraft and appropriate amounts of fuel being loaded on each flight.
Hawaiian’s Vice President Ann Botticelli said each passenger will be asked to participate until the airline has collected a statistically significant number of data points, about 3,000 people.
She stressed however, that passengers can opt out or if departure times are being impacted; a random program using every second, third or fourth passenger can be used to maintain on time performance.
Federal regulations require re-validation of the survey every three years, so Hawaiian is undertaking it again.
It is completely voluntary.
Passengers who participate will be weighed with their carry-on luggage.
Botticelli said, “We will not collect names or other personal information.”
Airlines may choose to conduct their own weight survey in markets in which they believe weight differs materially from FAA averages.
Three years ago, in coordination with and on the recommendation of the FAA, Hawaiian Airlines elected to conduct such a survey for selected routes, including their Pago Pago service, because its projected fuel consumption was lower than the actual consumption, indicating a possible weight discrepancy.
Hawaiian eliminated other possible factors that could explain the difference in fuel consumption such as weather, flight routing and wind before beginning the weight survey.
Asked if they are doing the same survey in other markets, Botticelli said, “We did similar weight surveys in our Asian markets, where the projected fuel consumption was higher than actual consumption. We just completed the new triennial survey in Japan.”
Asked if Hawaiian Airlines will be assigning seats based on passenger weight she said, “No. Individual passenger weights are not relevant to us.”
