Joel Tudor Denied At Airport & Warns Others, 'Don't Fly Hawaiian'

“I tried to fly Hawaiian this morning, it was booked through Alaska, because I fly Alaska all the time–at least a couple times a year, to Hawaii… I’ve flown with Hawaiian for at least 35 years and I’ve never in my life had a problem taking my longboards.” Adding, “I would know, I’m a 3x World Longboarding Champion.”

Apparently, they denied him any help in rebooking on another flight and didn’t refund him the fees he paid for his bags. According to the Hawaiian Airlines website, “You are welcome to check your boards with us as a standard bag with a special size allowance. We will accept one or more boards packed in a board bag with adequate padding up to 115 linear inches (292 cm) and 50lbs (23kg).” 

Now, Joel’s boards seemed to be under that mark, with 9’6 equaling 114 inches, the problem being that there is often a few extra inches needed in board bags. So even if your board is under 115 inches, the bag could add just enough length that an airline employee could bust you on it. Seems like whoever it was really didn’t know who they were messing with, for even if Joel wasn’t a World Champion with a following of nearly 200k, as a frequent flyer of 35 years, you’d think they’d cut him a break. Now they have to deal with the wrath of Instagram (at the time of writing his post has 3.5k likes, 334 comments, 18 reposts, and 485 shares). 

“If you’re a longboard, which is a majority of surfers–don’t fly Hawaiian!. Whatever you do, I’d be real careful flying Alaska too, because I have a feeling they’re going to get on the same program. You’ll get turned around and they’ll keep your money and eat your trip."

In the second half of the video, Joel speaks to the airline and says, “Ok the funnier part is that in your current advertisement, you have Zeke Lau riding a longboard with his daughter… You also sponsor the Duke Ocean Fest, which is a longboarding contest, which hosts longboarders from Australia and California. So you sponsor longboarding events but you deny longboarders the opportunity to bring boards on your planes. Then you tell them to go screw themselves and keep what you charged them to bring their boards on the plane…make it make sense.”

Not long ago, Billy Kemper made news by calling out Hawaiian Airlines in regards to their then crazy board bag fees on inter-island flights. His post caused enough uproar to change their policies. Since then, Hawaiian Airlines was bought by Alaskan Airlines (typically known for great board bag policies) and this post from Joel is sure to cause a headache on the PR front. 

Seems like they best review this policy and go ahead and add a few inches to spare them any future troubles.