When Vince Eckelkamp booked his family holiday to Hawaii, he never imagined that he would be the one flying the plane back home.
The Eckelkamp family was heading out of Maui on August 8, when chaos ensued because of the wildfires burning through Maui, canceling their flight and leaving them stranded at the airport.
Eckelkamp, a resident of Denver and a line training manager at United Airlines told USA TODAY that everything started going south on the last day of their vacation.
“We knew from weather reports that the wind was really supposed to kick up on Monday and Tuesday before we left. Monday wasn’t too bad but Tuesday, the day we were leaving, the winds were really bad,” said Eckelkamp, adding that the winds knocked out the power across the island, forcing them to pack and check out in the dark. Eckelkamp said that at that time they were unaware of the fires but were warned by the hotel management of the situation in Lahaina, which they had to pass to get to Kahului Airport.
The drive to the airport turned out to be a nightmare, as a result of the high winds and fires. However, the family managed to reach the airport on time.
Chaos
Their flight was initially scheduled to leave on time at 8 p.m. Tuesday, but after getting delayed several times, it was eventually canceled. Eckelkamp explained that flight attendants couldn’t make it to the airport because of the fires and that the airline was unable to track them down due to poor connection.
“At the time everything was just so much in chaos from the fires that were happening in real-time,” said Eckelkamp.
The flight was rescheduled to noon the next day and the Eckelcamp family along with other passengers on the plane were forced to spend the night at the airport as there were no hotel rooms available. However, it turned out that the airport was one of the safer places on the island with power, running water and food.
“That just tells you how bad and how chaotic it was.”
Eckelkamp said he knew the pilot who was scheduled…
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