Hawaiian Airlines Airbus A330-200 Returns To Seattle After Smoke Fills Cockpit

A Hawaiian Airlines flight from Seattle to Honolulu turned around shortly after takeoff on December 30th due to reports of fumes in the cockpit.
HA21 returned to Seattle
On Monday, December 30th, Hawaiian flight 21 was due to depart Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) at 08:15, but it encountered a delay. According to data from Flightradar24, the aircraft arrived in Seattle on December 28th after flying in from Kahului and remained on the apron on Sunday, December 29th.
The flight on December 30th eventually took off in a southerly direction from SEA at 12:41 and was expected to arrive at Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL) at 12:35 (local time – note there is a time difference). The flight climbed to around 6,650 feet, at which point the pilots identified fumes in the cabin and opted to return to the flight’s departure point.
The Airbus A330-200 aircraft turned above Key Center’s skies and traveled across Port Orchard and Northern Seattle before landing safely at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
Initially, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) noted that the crew reported seeing smoke on the flight deck; however, that has since been redacted, and it has been reported as fumes. The agency is now investigating.
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273 passengers onboard
The A330 operating the flight landed safely at Seattle Airport, and all 273 passengers and 10 crew members onboard remained unharmed. Simple Flying contacted Hawaiian Airlines for comment and did not respond when this article was published. However, the airline spokesperson, Marissa Villegas, relayed this message to the Associated Press:
“The captain declared an emergency to obtain priority handling and the Airbus A330 landed at SEA without incident.”
Photo: Angel DiBilio | Shutterstock
The flight was met by fire and medical personnel at the gate, who were available for assistance as passengers and crew deplaned. The Port of Seattle Fire Department also boarded the aircraft to inspect it, but it did not locate any smoke or strange fumes.
A replacement flight was scheduled the following day and was operated with a different aircraft.
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11.6-year-old Airbus A330-200
According to data from ch-aviation, the 11.6-year-old A330-200 at the center of the drama took its first test flight under French Airbus registration F-WWTX. The aircraft, called ‘Lehuakona,’ was delivered to Hawaiian Airlines on June 20, 2013, and now carries US registration N393HA.
It is currently configured to transport up to 278 passengers in a two-class layout (18 business and 260 in first class) and is powered by two Rolls-Royce Trent 772B-60 engines.
Photo: Nashville International Airport
The aircraft eventually got the all-clear to operate as HA21 on December 31st, a second service that operated between Seattle and Honolulu that day (with the same flight number – according to Flightradar24). The flight departed from Seattle at 08:50 and arrived in Honolulu at 12:24, with a flight time of five hours and 35 minutes.
The aircraft appears to have returned to regular service, and plans to operate an international service from Honolulu to Pago Pago International Airport (PPG), in American Samoa on Tuesday.