‘A White Something’ Passes a Mokulele Flight Over Hawaii

What happened

A Molokai resident was flying with Mokulele Airlines to Maui on Thursday 9 July 2026. She told Hawaii News Now that as the plane approached Kahului Airport it “popped through the cloud” and she saw “a white something” coming toward the aircraft. She said it was neither a bird nor another plane.

“Both pilots looked at each other and veered to the right,” she said. “They both looked at each other and boom, instantly they just turned.” She thinks the object was a drone. Mokulele told the station it has “no record of any near misses in this case.”

The footage

None of the reporting includes any photo or video of the object. Hawaii News Now’s story is built around an on-camera interview with the passenger, recorded about a week after the flight. The Daily Mail (25 July), IBTimes UK and the Daily Express US repeat her account and don’t add any images of the object. IBTimes UK says outright that there’s “no photographic evidence from inside the cabin.”

Timeline

• 29 August 2016: The FAA’s Part 107 small-drone rule takes effect. It caps drones at 400 feet above ground level unless they stay close to a structure.
• October 2019: This is the start of the earliest quarterly drone-sightings list still posted on the FAA’s sightings page.
• 9 July 2026: The flight takes place. The object is seen on approach to Kahului.
• 15 July 2026, 6:46 pm HST: Hawaii News Now publishes the story.
• 25 July 2026, 15:03 EDT: The Daily Mail runs a follow-up with comments from the airline, the FAA and the NTSB.
• Autumn 2026: The FAA posts its July–September 2026 sightings list.

What witnesses reported

• The flight was turbulent and in cloud for most of the way. “When you’re in the clouds, you see nothing.”
• The object appeared just as the plane came out of cloud near Kahului.
• It was white, and not a bird or a plane.
• Both pilots reacted and the plane turned right.

The passenger was frightened. Her words, as quoted, were that it “literally scared the ** out of me.”

What the research found

1. Nothing official backs up a near miss. Mokulele told Hawaii News Now, and later the Daily Mail, that it has no record of a near miss. The Daily Mail reported that neither the FAA nor the National Transportation Safety Board confirmed that another plane or craft was in the area.