Altercation Forces LA-Bound Flight To Return to Honolulu

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA) – A Hawaiian Airlines flight from Honolulu to Los Angeles was forced to turn around and make an emergency landing Tuesday evening back in Honolulu after two passengers got into a fight.

Hawaiian Airlines flight No. 2, carrying 276 passengers and 11 crew members, departed for Los Angeles at 5:50 p.m. Pacific time from Daniel K. Inouye International Airport.

About two hours into the flight, the pilots turned the plane around due to "two unruly passengers," the airline told CBS affiliate Hawaii News Now in a statement.

Multiple passengers told HNN that the fight between the two men started when one of them bumped the other with his chair.

"I just heard yelling, it started quietly, and I turned around and they were in each other's face already," fellow passenger Justin Moore-Brown told HNN.

The exact circumstances that prompted and escalated the fight were not confirmed, nor what exactly prompted the pilots to make the decision to turn the plane back.

Flight No. 2 landed back in Honolulu at about 9:30 p.m. Pacific time.

The airline said law enforcement met the plane when it landed. It's unclear if both men involved were arrested.

The plane finally departed Honolulu for the second time at 11:20 p.m. Pacific, finally landing at Los Angeles International Airport at 4:20 a.m. Wednesday.