Passengers aboard Hawaiian Airlines Flight 24 to Oakland, Calif., heard the alarm in the pilot’s voice when he announced shortly after takeoff Friday they would be returning to Kahului Airport.
"He was so nervous and he was stuttering," passenger Jim Krochka said. "He was understandably nervous. … My daughter was pretty scared. I started thinking this could be our time. I thought (the plane) might burst into a ball of flames."
The flight crew declared an emergency and returned to Maui due to a chemical smell in the cockpit, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
The flight, carrying 224 passengers and 10 crew members, departed at 11:18 a.m. and returned at 11:50 a.m. due to the fumes, the airline said.
Passengers evacuated by way of emergency slides at the airport.
No serious injuries were reported, but two people were "taken to the local hospital with minor injuries," an airline spokeswoman said.
Hawaiian Airlines is investigating the source of the odor, and the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board will also be investigating the incident.
A Transportation Department spokesman said some flights were diverted because the Boeing 767-300 remained on the runway after the landing. Hawaiian Airlines said two of its flights from the mainland were diverted to Honolulu Airport.
Krochka, who has been a passenger on hundreds of flights, said he knew something was wrong shortly after takeoff, citing a variety of signs, including what he thought was an electrical burning smell.
"The sound of the motor kept running to bring the landing gear up," the 68-year-old Walnut Creek, Calif., resident said. "I said, ‘Wait a minute. That’s not right.’"
"We took off, and just a few minutes into the flight, the plane didn’t seem to be rising quickly enough, and veered a little to the right and a little to the left," said Krochka, who was returning home with his daughter Jaymee, 23, from a vacation on Molokai.
"We got above the clouds and went down below the clouds," he said. "It rose again and the pilot came on."
That’s when he informed passengers the plane would have to return to Kahului.
"The smell started getting stronger and stronger," Krochka said. "That’s when people started getting more and more nervous."
He said it took about 20 minutes for the plane to land.
"It was a very emotional moment," said Krochka, a probate and estate planning attorney. "It doesn’t hit you until we got on the ground. We started crying."
Crew members were running around trying to find where the smell was coming from, opening overhead compartment bins, he said.
Northern California resident Margaret Stephens sat toward the back of the airplane with her husband.
"You could smell the fumes … like rubber," she said.
Passengers said once the airplane landed and emergency vehicles were near them, the pilot ordered everyone to evacuate.
Emergency doors opened and the slide chutes were deployed.
Passengers said the evacuation generally went smoothly, and praised the pilot.
"He did a great job," said Allen Souza, a San Francisco area resident.
Krochka said the evacuation slides are "steep, and you really go fast. … You hit the ground so hard."
As he was going down, he said he had to grab and pull to the side a 75-year-old woman at the bottom, to avoid colliding into her.
Krochka kept his knees bent, but other passengers, some "pretty old," weren’t able to move away quickly enough and got injured from others landing on them. He estimated five to 10 people had their ankles bandaged for injuries but did not go to the hospital.
Colorado resident Gail Hollander said she sprained her right foot when someone pushed her from behind as she slid down the chute.
She said her right foot went underneath her.
Lahaina resident Aloha Pacheco said she suffered a bruise on her knee during the evacuation but was grateful that the evacuation occurred on the land and not the ocean.
Hawaiian Airlines issued an apology for the disruption to customers.
"Safety is our highest priority and we were pleased with the swift and decisive actions of the crew," the carrier said. "All our team members are now focused on taking care of our customers and seeing them to their final destination as swiftly as possible."
Hawaiian said it would refund airfare for all affected passengers.
