Kiwi passengers stuck in Honolulu - Air NZ flight cancelled

Passengers trapped in Honolulu after Air NZ plane out-of-action. Photo / File

New Zealand passengers are stranded in Honolulu after yet another aircraft is out of action due to technical issues.

Aucklander Peter Boyes was due to depart his week-long holiday in Hawaii this morning but last night he was sent an email informing him that "due to a defect in the windscreen heating system" his flight had been cancelled.

Boyes, who has been travelling with a friend, said he had no idea how they would be getting home and was struggling to find a place to stay as his prior accommodation was all booked up.

"It was a bit of shocker. We woke up this morning to see they had re-booked us on a flight to Sydney and we had about half an hour before check-in closed, of course the accommodation we did manage to find was too far away to get there in time," Boyes said.

Boyes and his friend have since been re-booked on the next flight departing for New Zealand tomorrow.

"They've turned an eight-and-a-half-hour flight into a 16-hour flight. I could have been to England in that time," Boyes said.

An Air NZ spokeswoman said customers were contacted and advised to extend their stay at their hotel, with Air New Zealand contributing to the cost of the extra night.

"Alternatively they could head to the airport where the airline's staff would arrange hotel accommodation for the night," the spokeswoman said.

In the last three days, two other Air New Zealand flights faced the same problem.

Yesterday, a Air New Zealand flight — NZ101 — to Australia flew a short distance before turning around and heading back to Auckland Airport after the same technical issue.

The pilots elected to return to Auckland "as a precautionary measure due to an issue with the system that heats one of the windows in the flight deck", an Air NZ spokeswoman said.

"The aircraft landed without incident and customers are being accommodated on alternative services," she said.

Air New Zealand confirmed it was a separate aircraft.

On Sunday night, another Air NZ service — flight NZ80 — returned to Hong Kong a short time after taking off.

The pilots elected to return to Hong Kong "as a precautionary measure due to fault with one of the hydraulic systems onboard", the spokeswoman said.

The aircraft landed without incident.

She said the issues aboard both flights were "separate and unrelated".

A source told the Herald the pilots aboard the NZ80 flight noticed a bang shortly after take-off from Hong Kong and found the aircraft was losing fluid in its central hydraulic system.

The pilots then had to dump 50 tonnes of fuel in order to land before the plane was towed off the runway.

The aircraft that suffered window problems on the Honolulu route is an Boeing older 777-200 the airline is leasing from Boeing as some of its Dreamliners are out of action with engine problems.

The near-16-year-old 777 was formerly flown by Singapore Airlines. Passengers on some flights between Auckland and Honolulu have complained about faulty inflight entertainment on the plane.

Since the Dreamliner engine problems first hit in December, Air New Zealand has leased planes from Portugal's Hi Fly — which also sparked complaints from passengers about entertainment systems — and is also about to start services with a newer 777-300 leased from Taiwan's Eva Air.

These different aircraft used on long-haul routes also mean passengers who have booked and paid for tickets months in advance are now being told the seats they wanted are no longer available.

Air New Zealand has had Rolls-Royce Trent 1000 engines inspected and in some cases repaired after a global alert. This meant those aircraft have their range from alternate landing fields restricted.

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