Lihue Airport — Attraction in Kauai

Arrived at Lihue 3 hours before our 8:15 pm flight. Checked our bags without issue; although it was odd to just place your bag with dozens of other bags in the ticketing area rather than handing over to an agen. Proceeded to the one security checkpoint open at that time which had two officers checking IDs, two scanning lines going, and at least 4 or 5 TSA officers standing around talking with one another. We waited in the TSA line for over an hour and were still only in the middle of the line before TSA opened a second checkpoint; at which time, only the people who arrived in the prior 0 to 15 minutes benefitted as they were furthest back in the line and so they were the ones to go to the newly opened checkpoint versus those who had been waiting for over an hour. Shortly thereafter, around 6:45 pm, one of the two officers left and was not replaced, leaving just one officer checking IDs for both general boarding and precheck passengers. The scanner lines also dropped from two lines to one line at this time, further slowing things down. As we finally moved through security we heard overhead that a third checkpoint was opened. There is a finite predetermined number of passengers going through security during any given time period. New flights don't just randomly get added without notice. TSA needs to do better with their staffing and plan appropriately for the passenger volume which again is not a surprise number. We had a similar experience at Lihue 8 years ago and have read similar reviews or experiences online so this doesn't seem to be a new or isolated issue. Please look in to the TSA staffing and planning matrix at the airports in Hawaii. Having several hundred passengers standing in nonairconditioned lines for several hours is absolutely...

Staff was just extremely unhelpful, smart with the mouth when you speak up for yourself, lack empathy, compassion and a sense of urgency.

Very poor service and sense of urgency considering there aren’t many options for passengers if something goes wrong. I waited in line for over an hour and missed my flight. They only had two clerks helping the entire time while the 3-5 other TSA employees literally just stood around.

The TSA clerk let her coworker cut in line and when I said it was unfair because I’d been waiting for over an hour and she just walked up her excuse was that she was an employee and I guess employees that don’t pay for anything here are more important than the paying customers that will eventually be displaced due to them not caring what happens to us. That TSA clerk was argumentative and had no empathy or compassion and felt entitled to push her coworker ahead of others.

A woman did pass out and someone from the line ran to help her quicker than an employee. In fact the employee was standing a distance away probably calling an ambulance yet still not engaging with an overheating woman that needed help. This held up the line as well yet in the end everyone had to suffer whatever time it lost us.

Finally, when I got to the Hawaiian airlines counter the clerk kept smirking as if it was funny that I was one of the 5 people that clearly missed their flight due to the poor quality and sense of urgency provided by TSA.

None of the employees apologized for the poor service which confirms how much they don’t care about what happens to the passengers. One man stepped up and began helping the line then backed after only letting in about five people so it went back...

We arrived to the island around 8am on a Monday. Very little traffic. Followed the signage and walked straight out of the terminal gate, through the open-air hallway, crossed the crosswalk outside, greeted by some chickens, found our rental car shuttle and started our vacation. Easy, no problems.

Flight out was at 2pm on a Friday. We arrived around 12:30pm. Took about 30 minutes to go through TSA with 4 agents working, not too bad.

It's an open-air airport but can get pretty humid, especially in the bathrooms. Many informative and beautiful cultural photos along the main hallway. Minimal things to do inside: one restaurant, a Starbucks and 2 out of 4 shops was open.

I was waiting for my husband in front of the bathroom, sitting on one of many rows of chairs, on a phone call, and a guy from agriculture stopped mid walk and asked to check my bags. Pretty random but sure. He opened all my bags on the floor and barely checked the top and proceeded to walk.

We were there pretty early so we walked up and down the main hallway.. There were machines and staff stationed right in front of the terminal gates to check for agriculture. We walked by 3 agriculture check points/machines from gates 1-6 without getting checked. When we started walking towards gates 9-10, there were two men stationed at gate 7-8. We walked by thinking it's not our gate, so we didn't need to check right? Wrong. One guy commanded and yelled at us to put our stuff onto the machine. Very rude. Mind you, one of the two guys already 'randomly' checked my bags on the floor 15 minutes back.

My husband and I both speak fluent English. No need to be mean. Very disappointing way to end our trip to this...