Hawai'i airline seats down this year

Advertiser Staff and News Services

The number of airline seats coming into Hawai'i was down slightly in the first quarter compared to the same period last year, state economists said yesterday, a figure that mirrors visitor arrivals in the early part of the year.

Airlines provided 2.38 million seats to the Islands between January and March, according to the report from the Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism, compared to 2.4 million last year, a drop of 1 percent. The largest decline was seen in charter seats, which fell 15 percent.

Total domestic seats were off 1.7 percent, the report said. International seats were down only 0.2 percent.