Sandy is affecting thousands of flights as well as vacations in the Big Apple.
Mother Nature is joining many Hawaii residents vacationing on the East Coast including Lance Rae in New York.
"The Dunkin Donuts on the ground level, the sign just went up in the air and crashed on the ground," Rae said.
The Hawaii resident says the superstorm canceled the Broadway shows he was planning to watch. But people are still going about their business.
"There are still people walking across the street and they’re holding their hats and clinging onto things so they don’t blow away," Rae said.
Here at home, Sandy is canceling flights in and out of Honolulu Airport, including United’s flights to Newark and Dulles and Hawaiian Airlines’ flight to JFK.
"We’ve added an additional flight scheduled right now for Tuesday afternoon because we don’t know if JFK is going to be open Wednesday morning," said Ann Botticelli with Hawaiian Airlines.
If passengers change flights or request a refund due to the superstorm, Hawaiian and United will waive the change fees.
"It’s our obligation we feel, our moral responsibility to get these passengers back as quickly as we can, so we thought it was really important to put that extra flight up," she said.
Some local hotels are helping to accommodate visitors who are stuck in Honolulu, and are also offering discounted rates.
Sandy has forced thousands of people into over a hundred American Red Cross shelters in nine states. The Hawaii chapter is reaching out to local volunteers for possible deployment.
"So we were really pretty busy with our own tsunami scare so I think that’s why we didn’t deploy, but we probably will be deploying soon when we know what’s happening," said Coralie Chun Matayoshi with the American Red Cross Hawaii Chapter.
In August, 24 local Red Cross volunteers deployed to the mainland to assist with Hurricane Isaac relief efforts, such as damage assessment and sheltering.
"And the conditions were pretty harsh and I think this is going to be the same," she said.
Passengers booked on a flight on United or Hawaiian tomorrow, should contact the airline to see if the flights are still on schedule.
See the original article at: KHON2 Local News
