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to find ways to survive . The Saab 340s proved the key to Loganair ’ s overall survival .
Loganair decided to relaunch its Saab 340 air ambulance concept to transport patients critically ill with COVID19 from the islands to the mainland . The airline thus outfitted two Saab 340s ( G-LGNC and G-LGNG ) as air ambulances , with the two airframes remaining in this configuration until October 2021 . Loganair continued to operate a very slimmed-down passenger schedule , providing only a skeleton of essential services to the islands , and it used the downtime to extensively maintain its Saab fleet .
The Saab 340 fleet really showed its capabilities once home-testing kits were massproduced and had to be delivered . Loganair ’ s contracts with the Royal Mail , the primary distributor of the kits across the
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UK , expanded . The airline fully loaded most of its Saab 340s , passenger , and freighters with test kits and , later , vaccines . There may have been barely any passengers traveling , but Loganair had crucial work to do — and the workhorse was the Saab 340 .
As lockdowns began to lift worldwide and air travel returned to normal , Loganair ’ s dependency on the Saab 340 abated . More ATRs arrived . Once the -600s joined , with their stateof-the-art cockpits and shortfield performance , the Saab 340s really began to disappear . The first ATR42-600 ( G-LMSA ) joined the fleet in August 2021 , and the first ATR72-600 ( G-LMTA ) the following October .
Loganair phased out one of its 340s in 2018 , three in 2020 , eight in 2022 , three in 2023 , and the final two in 2024 . Glasgow and Aberdeen remained as the last
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two passenger Saab 340 bases . When Glasgow waved goodbye to its last Saab 340 flights , in October 2023 , Aberdeen became the sole Saab 340 base — up until the farewell celebrations and final flights .
THE FAREWELL FLIGHT EXPERIENCE
To conclude its series of celebrations , Loganair announced four flights around Glasgow and morning and afternoon hangar tours over the weekend of January 20 and 21 , 2024 . The response was overwhelming , with everything being sold out within four hours . In response , Loganair added an extra flight , the positioning one to Aberdeen and the final flight to Glasgow became bookable , and a special event .
I took the first flight on the Sunday and was one of the first to book upon its
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11 Loganair Saab 340B G-LGNC MSN318 Cockpit , Captain ’ s side , close up . |