Mokulele passenger claims white object approached plane mid-flight

News admin July 16, 2026 0 Comments

Mokulele passenger claims white object approached plane mid-flight

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – On a recent Mokulele Airlines flight from Molokai to Maui, a passenger said she saw “a white something” approach the aircraft that she believed was not a bird, nor another plane.

Molokai resident Tami Dixon said the sight “scared that out of me. Literally scared the **** out of me.”

Already anxious in the air while traveling to the Valley Isle for eye surgery, Dixon said last Thursday’s turbulent flight added to her nerves.

“When you’re in the clouds, you see nothing,” Dixon said.

But when the plane approached Kahului Airport, Dixon saw the “white something” she described after the aircraft “popped through the cloud.”

Because of how the object looked to her, Dixon believes it was a drone.

Mokulele told Hawaii News Now it has no record of any near misses in this case, but Dixon said its pilots acted quickly.

“Both pilots looked at each other and veered to the right,” Dixon described, commending the pilot’s immediate reaction. “Oh, fabulous. They both looked at each other and boom, instantly they just turned.”

While a drone is not confirmed as the cause of the scare, the encounter has experienced operators urging others to fly responsibly.

“The FAA establishes very clear guidelines of where aircraft can fly. Kind of like on a highway, you have your own driving lane, right? So if everyone follows the rules and it’s pono, they should never actually interact or you should never have one car or aircraft entering another car’s lane,” said Timo Sullivan of Aloha Aina Drones.

Gabe Hanohano of Hawaii Pacific Drone Solutions echoed Sullivan’s sentiment: “We are very fortunate to fly in Hawaii, considering how unique our airspace is with military bases and airports. We’re lucky that I believe our people here are very cognizant of our environment and surroundings… I feel like our flyers are a bit different in the sense.”