Hawaiian’s Fourth New Airbus Named Southern Cross

The Hawawaiian Airlines fourth Airbus A330 last Friday following its inaugural arrival at HNL. Photo credit: Damian Balinowski.

By Sonia Isotov

Hawaiian Airlines took delivery of its fourth new Airbus A330-200 from the AirBus factory in Toulouse, France.

Then, the aircraft was flown nonstop to Los Angeles, and put it to work on its first commercial flight three days later on Friday, April 15.

This latest addition to Hawaiian’s fleet is one of two new A330s to be delivered to the airline this

year. Hawaiian is scheduled to take delivery of three more of the 294-seat wide-body aircraft in 2012, three in 2013, three in 2014 and two more in 2015.

Hawaiian’s new A330s will continue to serve the company’s busiest routes between Honolulu and Los Angeles and Las Vegas in the coming months before being introduced to international service later this year.

Hawaiian Airlines

The new A330 is named Hanaiakamalama, which is the Hawaiian name for the Southern Cross

constellation. Hawaii is the only state from which the Southern Cross can be seen in the night sky and it is believed that ancient Polynesians used the constellation in the southern hemisphere to navigate their way to the Hawaiian Islands. All of Hawaiian’s new A330s are named for a constellation or star used by Polynesian voyagers for celestial navigation.

Hawaiian has plans to introduce up to 32 new Airbus aircraft into its fleet by the end of the decade. In addition to the four A330s already in the fleet, Hawaiian has confirmed agreements in place to acquire 13 more A330s and six A350XWB-800 (Extra Wide-Body) aircraft (starting in 2017), along with purchase rights for an additional three A330s and six A350s.