Hawaii Tourism Authority CEO George D. Szigeti says the embarrassing false missile alert gaffe has not had much of an impact in travel demand to the islands – yet.
"Thankfully, we have seen little to no impact in travel demand for the Hawaiian Islands in these first few days following the false alert. We are monitoring this situation closely and maintaining continuous contact with our tourism marketing partners in 10 global travel markets. Thus far, just a small number of concerns have been reported by travelers or travel trade professionals," Szigeti said.
The HTA said they had received ‘just a handful’ of inquiries related directly to the missile alert mishap which left the state in a panic for more than half an hour at the weekend.
"We are also in contact with the visitor industry locally about potential impacts to their businesses. Industry partners are understandably angry about the false alert, but none have reported to HTA an undue number of cancellations since it was issued," Szigeti added.
The problem was the result of human error after an employee enacted a real live missile alert message complete with an ominous ‘this is not a drill’ alert instead of the regular test alert.
"Our message to travelers continues to be that there is no cause to cancel trips already booked to Hawaii or to look elsewhere for a vacation because of this false alert. Hawaii is and continues to be a safe, secure and welcoming destination to all visitors from around the world."
