Hawai’i is the most remote location on Earth. No other place on earth is so far away from its neighbor landmass as the Hawaiian Islands are. Honolulu, which means Quiet Harbor, is on the Island of O’ahu and next to the famous holiday resort of Waikiki.
The airport is right next to the city and even Waikiki is but a short drive away. No matter where you are coming from, you are likely to be landing after a flight of at least 5 hours but there are direct flights from Newark and Atlanta and then the flight time is almost double that.
O’ahu is characterized by the mountain range extending along the spine of the island and the almost permanent cloud formations on the windward side of the mountains. What you see is the trade winds hitting the hills and dropping their moisture. The windward side of O’ahu is the fresh-water machine of the whole island! The lee-side is sunny and mostly dry with a gentle breeze caressing your skin making even the hottest day pleasant.
In case you were wondering about the apostrophe between some of the letters in the place names like O’ahu… well that is the ‘okina in the Hawaiian language. The ‘okina is a letter in their alphabet, except that instead of pronouncing it, you stop for a fraction of a second! The ‘okina can even be there as the very first “letter” in a word, as in the word ‘okina itself. A strange thing for sure, but you can learn to pronounce it correctly… in time.
HNL airport is on the bay on the lee-side with one of its four runways on an artificial island. Only two landing directions are equipped with ILS but with their stable weather and wind conditions that is probably all they ever need. There are RNAV procedures for all the runways though.
Talking about the weather… On one occasion we asked a store manager how the weather was in the winter. He had to consult one of his assistants enquiring innocently: when do we have winter here? A few days later we were chatting with a genuine island girl and she was shocked to hear about our weather in Belgium with usually more clouds than sunshine… How do you know what time it is if you can’t see the sun? – she asked. She was dead serious…
The tower to-day is an element of the FAA facility that provides air traffic services not only for the Islands but also for a large chunk of the Pacific. The area control centre was originally housed in the crater of an extinct volcano called Diamond Head. They were the only ACC in the world located in a crater!
The Federal Aviation Administration dedicated its state of the art Air Traffic Control facility on January 11, 2002 to support air traffic needs in the State of Hawaii and the National Airspace System (NAS).
The facility centralizes the Honolulu Center Radar Approach Control (CERAP), the Hawaii-Pacific System Manage Office (SMO), Honolulu Airport Traffic
Control Tower (ATCT) and the Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON). The HCF enhances the FAA’s ability to provide for the safe, secure and efficient movement of air traffic, and ensures that NAS users are provided optimum levels of service and safety. The combined services provided by the HCF include the control of en-route air traffic, arrivals, departures, and over-flights in and around the numerous airports of the Hawaiian Island chain, as well as to aircraft from the U.S. Mainland, Asia, South Pacific, New Zealand and Australia.
The complex includes an air traffic control operations room with 17 radar control positions; a Service Operations Center for the Pacific; an electronic equipment room; mechanical and electrical environmental area; administrative offices, building support warehouses and an employee cafeteria. More than 200 FAA employees work in the facility.
Arriving in HNL is an experience unto itself. After hours and hours of blue sky and blue ocean the island chain pops up slowly with the clouds marking its location even before land can be seen. It is said that the original Polynesian settlers found the islands because of the clouds which were a sure sign of land in their book.
Stepping out from the plane you walk towards the main terminal and are greeted by a live orchestra playing island music as long as there are passengers. An open bridge at the end of the concourse provides the first glimpse of the rich plant and animal life of O’ahu except that it is all part of the airport cafeteria. The ramp control tower looks down over this incredible airport hall.
The ATC tower is modern and tall but curiously it too radiates that hard to define, caressing and warm but very real sphere the locals call “Aloha spirit”.
Welcome to paradise!
