 Welcome to Much More On Medicine. I'm your host, Catherine Nohr. Governor Ige has announced that the 14-day quarantine for inner island travel will be lifted on June 16th. I'm sure many of you are looking forward to traveling again, but some of you may have some concerns and questions. I'm pleased to be talking with Senior Vice President of Hawaiian Airlines, Avi Matmanas, about health and safety in the air and the changes Hawaiian Airlines has implemented because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr. Matmanas is responsible for Hawaiian Airlines' brand product advertising and promotions, direct marketing and direct sales and service channels. Recently he's been a key player in their COVID-19 response. Mr. Matmanas earned his BA from Brown University and his MBA at Wharton School of Business. Welcome, Avi. Aloha, thanks for having me. It's great to have you here and I know we'll get right into it with some important questions for you. Number one, when I travel, one of my concerns is, am I breathing in all the dirty air that other passengers are exhaling? Tell me about circulated air and what Hawaiian Airlines does about that. It's a great question and it's something that I think is often not well understood by our guests and the technology in airplanes has improved dramatically. Some air is recirculated but it's constantly being replenished with fresh air from outside the aircraft and all of the air that recirculates through the cabin is run through HEPA filters, these high efficiency particulate filters which are the same ones at the same level that are used in hospitals and sensitive environments and so any of the air that's recirculated is put through a very efficient filter that's effective at removing things from the air that would make you sick. And the other things that I think are important on some of our aircraft like the 717s, the air isn't recirculated at all, it actually flows right through, so these are our inner island aircraft and so there the air is constantly being replenished and what you're breathing is actually fresh air that's been conditioned for temperature but has come right into the airplane and so I think air quality on the airplane is probably better than a lot of other places you could be breathing. It's probably better than in my office right now with an air conditioning and I'm in a medical office. Actually, I'm not really on a plane but I wanted you to think I was. I think we're all in a place now where we like to imagine ourselves being back on plane so I appreciate your image. Absolutely and I got seated really up front today. So okay, so now we've taken care of the air, I feel comfortable, I'm not worried about breathing and COVID and so now let's ask, let me ask you about cleaning procedures, am I gonna have to bring my Clorox wipes and wipe down everything around me or do you guys clean it yourselves? Well, certainly we've always cleaned the planes ourselves and it's always been a really important part of what we do but the advent of COVID has made us rethink how we do every step of the cleaning process and so we've gone through step by step, revisited how we clean the aircraft, really focused on applying antiviral agents to the really high touch surfaces so we can really careful about the things you touch like tray tables and seatbelt buckles and we've introduced the image that just came up was a new device that we've introduced which is called an electrostatic sprayer which we use to spray a very, very fine mist of an antiviral agent through the whole cabin. What that does is it will coat surfaces that you can't necessarily get to when you're cleaning with a cloth or some other thing and so we think that that even further enhances the cleanliness and the safety of the aircraft and at the same time we understand, the last thing I'll say, you mentioned bringing your Clorox wipes on board and that's become very much part of people's habit. One of the things that we do on board now and have since I think early March is it passed out sanitizing wipes to our guests at the beginning because no matter how good a job we do, I think it gives our guests an extra degree of comfort to feel like you have a bit of control to make sure that you wipe down surfaces yourself and so people are still welcome to bring their own but we are providing those as an amenity to our guests and understand how important it is when people get on a plane to feel safe and feel like things are clean. Sure and I've definitely watched people do that especially when I flew mid-March, the last time I flew and we also, there are a few things on board that we know that other people have been touching things like the magazine in the seat pocket or maybe people have been reading a newspaper on board and leave the newspaper. Why don't you tell us about those? Sure and I think Hanahoa, which is our in-flight magazine I think selfishly is the best in-flight magazine in the entire world and I know our guests really enjoy it and take it with them. So it's not an amenity that we wanna do away with entirely. For the time being, we've taken it off the aircraft and it's no longer in the seat back pockets because that was a place where I think people were concerned about cleanliness. One of the interesting, this is a little inside airline industry problem but one of the interesting things that happened as people started bringing more and more of their own wet wipes on the plane is the natural thing to do is stick them into the seat back pocket. So people were, we were having a lot of the magazines just get damaged by virtue of the wet wipes that people were putting in there. So we've done away with them entirely and in the seat back and they'll be available for distribution when you board. So what we would welcome every guest to do is to pick up a brand new copy of Hanahou when they come on board and they can dispose of it or take it with them. Hopefully they'll take it with them as many of our guests like to do when they get off the aircraft. So we'll be doing that for the near term, for the longer term I think we're working with the publishers to try and figure out alternative solutions whether that's wrapping the magazines in plastic or finding some other alternative mechanism for distribution. Because again, content that's in that magazine is really something you can't find anywhere else. And I think a really great representation of our brand but also just a great way to get to learn things about life in Hawaii that people didn't otherwise know. Sure. And when I travel in Europe when you're boarding the plane they will give you, they pass out magazines and newspapers they don't have them on the plane already they actually pass them out on certain flights. So that's another possible idea I suppose. Now we're constantly looking at all the things that we could do. And I think one of the things that is very clear about this is the measures that we're taking now to make sure that people feel safe are going to evolve over the coming months and they're going to evolve because our understanding of the disease is going to get better and we're gonna have better ideas that cause technology is gonna come out that helps us improve the cleanliness. And so the most important thing I think that we can do as an airline to keep people safe is to continue to evolve our practices as we learn more, as people's needs change and as technology improves. And how have you evolved the boarding practice? We've looked at boarding very carefully. That's one of the times that you're, you can be around a lot of people I think anyone who's experienced boarding before has felt the presence of others around them in a sense of urgency to get on a plane. Everyone really just wants to get on their way. And it's one of the higher stress times as well. So we've looked for things that we can do that allow for physical distancing, improve the safety of the experience but also hopefully make it a little lower stress over time for people as well. For boarding, what we've done is to, first of all, put markings in all of the lanes where people wait in line to make sure that people keep distance. And then we will be calling people in smaller boarding groups from the back to the front of the aircraft to reduce the amount of contact or potential contact that you have with someone in the aisle. We'll pre-board those with physical needs to have a little more time first because we obviously want to take care of our guests with disabilities. We'll pre-board our first class guests so that they can be seated and in their seats at the time everyone else boards. And then we'll board from back to front in groups of anywhere from one to three rows, depending on how full the plane is to give people the space and the time that they need to board without feeling like they are up face to face with any of their other fellow travelers. Avi, will the passengers have to answer questions regarding their health or have their temperature taken before they board the plane? You know, that's not a function that we as an airline necessarily control. So we're not going to be doing any of that directly. I know both at the state and the federal level that those kinds of screening measures are things that are being looked at. So today, you know, within the state of Hawaii, we've got people taking temperatures both on departure and on arrival in some cases. In some form of that, temperature screening is likely to continue. And I think there's a role for both temperature screening and health questions and other measures as we think about a layered system of screening that helps to keep guests safe, but also our community safe as we reopen air travel. And do you have any policy about if you know a person either has a temperature, they're coughing or exhibiting symptoms? What do you do? Well, I think the first message is really not to travel if you're not feeling well. And that's something that I think now we have to be very sensitive to. We wanna make sure that our policies give people the flexibility that if you are sick on the day of travel, you really just shouldn't come to the airport and we'll work with people to accommodate that. Certainly if people present at the airport with symptoms or anything that would give us concern that they're unwell, we have procedures in place. And we've always had these procedures because it's always been an issue that people might show up not feeling well. We have procedures to give people, refer people to a secondary medical screening by a medical professional who can assess whether or not they're ready to fly or not. And if they're not ready to fly, we work with people to reaccommodate them at a time when they are. And have you done anything to change your seating configuration or how you seat people on the airline so they can maintain social distance? We are doing our best to try and space people out on the airplane. And obviously physical distancing on an aircraft is a very difficult thing to do. There's just not that much space. Right now, as very, very few people are flying, it's a bit easier. And so we've blocked some seats on our seat map. In some cases, on some aircraft, we've limited the actual capacity to which we will sell the aircraft to maximize the spacing between parties. If you're traveling with your family, we will accommodate you to make sure that you can sit together, but we'll try and leave as much space between people as possible. But I think those are temporary measures. And it's really our view and the view of the scientific advisors who've consulted with the airline industry that being on an aircraft is quite safe. There's very little evidence to date, even during the period of time when airlines were flying quite a bit in the early parts of the pandemic, there's been very little evidence of passenger to passenger transmission of COVID. Even in cases that we know of in which people were infected and flu or even symptomatic and flu, there's been extensive contact tracing done on all of the people who sat within two or three rows around that person. And there are very few, to my knowledge, on any instances in which we've seen that happen. And so I think because of the fact that people are all facing in the same direction, you're often not unless you have a really chatty seatmate engaged in a lot of a conversation with people. People are sort of doing their own thing. They're facing the same direction. There are partitions between you and the person in front of you. As I talked about, the air filtration systems are really excellent and the airflow is from top to bottom and then out. And so we think there are lots of factors that contribute to an aircraft being a very safe place. And you add to that the notion that everyone's gonna be wearing a face covering on board. We don't believe that it will be unsafe for people to be sitting next to someone in our current aircraft configuration. But we understand that people are concerned about that. And so at least initially, if people get back to flying, we wanna do everything we can to maximize that physical distance and spacing on the aircraft. Perfect. Okay, we're taking a short break. I'm Catherine Norr. This is much more on medicine on the Think Tech Live Streaming Network series. We're talking with Hawaiian Air Lion Senior Vice President, Avi Manas, about health and safety in the air. Aloha, I'm John David Ann, the host of History Lens on Think Tech Hawaii. History Lens deals with contemporary events and looks at them through a historical perspective or what we call a history lens. The show is streamed live on ThinkTechHawaii.com. Thanks so much for watching our show. We look forward to seeing you then. Mahalo and Aloha. Catherine Norr, and this is much more on medicine on the Think Tech Live Streaming Network series. And we're talking with Hawaiian Air Lion Senior Vice President, Avi Manas, about health and safety in the air. Avi, I'm so excited about what you're telling me. I'm feeling much more relaxed. I'm ready to get on a plane. Good, all you need is the Mai Tai and we'll be ready to go. I know, you got it. And that leads me to a very important question. What about masks? Are passengers required to wear masks? Yes, they are now. And going forward for the foreseeable future, our guests will be required to wear a face covering of some sort on board. There are exceptions, obviously, for people who have medical conditions that would make it difficult for them to wear a mask and for small children. But everyone else would like to wear a mask both for their own protection, but also as a courtesy to all of the people around them. Sure, and do crew members wear masks? Yes, that's been the case for some time. All of our guest-facing employees, both on the ground and in the air, will also be wearing a face covering and other kinds of personal protective equipment as it's appropriate to the role and the tasks that they're doing. And so they'll have access to gloves for tasks where it's appropriate for them to be wearing gloves. We're looking at all kinds of other personal protective equipment to make sure that we're keeping our crew safe, our employees safe, but also that we're making our guests feel like they can travel confidently. And the other thing that I would mention is, if we do have someone on board who becomes unwell or who needs medical assistance, if our crew all have access to full medical grade personal protective equipment, should we need to assist someone who's unwell? So we've really taken every precaution to make sure that both our employees and our guests are as safe as possible. And if a passenger does not have a face covering, do you have extra that you can provide them? We do. We do have extra that we can provide. We'll ask generally as people are boarding to make sure that people are ready to travel and have their face covering, but should someone show up and not have a face covering handy, we do have a small supply that we can provide to people. Okay, and if a passenger wants to eat or drink, are they permitted to remove their face covering? Yeah, absolutely. As people are eating or drinking, we understand that they will need to remove their face covering. Again, this is really about sort of courtesy and care to your fellow guests. And so I think most people when they get on board will be conscientious about that and wear their face covering when they're not doing something like eating or drinking. Okay, and I have heard rumor that there are airlines that require passengers to raise their hands to get permission to use the restroom. Are you doing anything like that? You know, we don't have any specific plan around that. I know that that is something that people are working on to try and avoid congestion. We've worked very hard as we've designed the layout of our aircraft to make sure that the laboratories are available and that we spread them out across the aircraft so that it doesn't create a lot of congestion. But certainly these can be longer flights and as we introduce the long haul flights, we may have to think about how we manage that. But in general, we'll just be asking people not to congregate in the aisle for the safety of everyone. Sure. And will crew continue to be serving food and beverages on flights? Or is that limited in any way? It's certainly something that we have looked at how we adapt to the new environment and we'll continue to do so. We think that hospitality is a really core part of what we do and it's one of the things that differentiates us as an airline. And so we don't want to do away entirely with all of the elements of our hospitality that our guests have come to expect. And so we still want to offer people complimentary drinks and some form of complimentary food. And so we're still doing meal service. We've adapted that to try and minimize contact to reduce the number of times that someone has to interact with one of our flight attendants and to eliminate elements of risk. So we won't be pouring beverages for the foreseeable future. We'll be giving people whole cans of things. We won't be selling any alcoholic beverage because of the amount of contact that has to happen as you're doing credit card transaction. And so we really thought through a lot of the elements of the process and the mechanics of it and how we can still deliver the hospitality that people expect and the warmth that people expect when they travel with us but to minimize the risk for guests and crew. And one of my pet peeves is when a flight attendant pours water in a plastic glass and picks up the water by where you would put your lips to drink it with their hands and serves it. I don't know if you've ever seen that. I haven't seen it on a Hawaiian flight but it does bother me. You know, it is something I've observed both as a traveler and I've had the chance to go out with some of our fabulous flight crew and do some service. And it's something I've caught myself doing from time to time because it's a really hard instinct to unlearn especially when you're as bad at being a flight attendant as I am. But it is something, you know, again, that we try and prevent by not refilling cups by giving people new cups whenever they ask for something which we know has an offsetting ecological impact if you try and manage as well. But in the near term, the risk prevention around COVID is a more important priority. And so we'll be looking at all of those things and trying to figure out how we manage those as effectively as we can. Sure, and I have been on international flights that where when you go to your seat, there's an actual full bottle of water on the seat for you. And then I found on those flights that the flight attendants hardly ever go through the aisles with water. So I find that kind of interesting. It was kind of like, yes, you get your bottle of water, but you really won't get service. Have you seen that? I've certainly seen that. We wanna make sure that we're giving our guests what they need but also giving them an opportunity to interact with our people because even in a time of pandemic, our people are the very heart of what we do and they're what's very best about our brand. And so they'll be behind a mask and they'll be behind personal protective equipment, but they're still fabulous people. And we wanna make sure that our guests have a chance to experience that hospitality. Sure, and that definitely has been my experience with the Hawaiian Airlines. Now, are there differences that you're implementing for inner island versus mainland or international flights? Yeah, each service is a little bit different in terms of obviously how long people are on the aircraft and also the level of service that we deliver. And so we've been operating through this whole pandemic. We've been operating inner island flights and a few flights to the U.S. mainland in order to provide some essential air service and get cargo back and forth. And so we've been doing service all along and each one is a little bit, a little bit different. The neighbor island service is obviously quite a quick service. We'll still be distributing those sealed cups of juice and water that people have upon this floor and doing that service for the longer haul service. Again, we're still delivering a meal and beverage service, but we're doing it in an abbreviated way that minimizes contact. And have you implemented any procedures or rules regarding frequency of hand sanitizing for your crew? Certainly, that's always been something. I mean, we are in a business of having contact with lots and lots of people and serving food. And so we've always had very, very rigorous standards around hand washing. And I know that all of our guest facing employees take that very seriously, but certainly even more so now. And in light of the challenges we've had for the past couple months, do you have any, have you done anything to allow people to reschedule their flights if they couldn't take them due to stay at home orders or quarantine? Certainly. I mean, we've had, we've had to cancel the vast majority of our schedule starting, starting in March. And so we have, when we've canceled flights, given people the opportunity to get refunds or to take credits for future travel, as people have had to change their plans, we've offered the ability to get, to get credits. We've extended the time period in which people can use those out to two years, understanding that people might not be ready right away to get on board. It's been very challenging for us from a customer service perspective. I would be the first to acknowledge we've had, we've had more requests for people to change their flights in the months of March and April. And I think we've had in, ever had in our history. And so I know that it took us longer than we would have liked to get back to some of our guests. I know it's taken longer than we would have liked to process some of the refunds. And we're still working through that, but we have a very strong commitment to making sure that when people are ready to travel again, that we're there for them. And we want to make sure that we're as accommodating as possible from that process. Well, Avi, I can't wait to get on a Hawaiian Airlines flight. And I appreciate you so much today for being here. Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's been great to talk about it. And as the inner island quarantine gets lifted on the 16th, that'll be an exciting opportunity for more people to travel around the islands. And we're excited to think beyond that to the reopening of long haul travel and the opportunity for everyone to get out and travel again. And we're excited to welcome people back. Terrific. Well, we're out of time. I'm Catherine Norr. This is much more on medicine on the think tech live streaming network series. We've been talking with Hawaiian Airlines senior vice president, Avi Manos about health and safety in the air. Thank you for joining us today. Please take care of yourself, wash your hands and be kind to one another.