Loganair will remain a torchbearer for sustainable aviation, insists new chief executive Luke Farajallah – a mission begun by his predecessor.
However, as he enters his second six months piloting the UK’s largest regional airline, the industry veteran who has had stints at Flybe and Wizz Air has been dealing with a more pressing matter: restoring operational resilience and a reputation damaged during a rocky recovery from Covid-19.
For years, Loganair was a tiny Scottish airline serving largely public-service obligation (PSO) routes north of the border, but its route network burgeoned in the 2010s. It grew again on the eve of the pandemic when it took over 16 UK and international services operated by defunct Flybe, its former franchise partner. Coping with that expansion amid post-Brexit crew shortages and delays to deliveries of ATRs – brought in to replace ageing Saab 340s – led to serious schedule disruption after passenger traffic began to pick up in 2022.
Former chief executive Jonathan Hinkles left suddenly in January after more than seven years in charge, announcing his departure to colleagues on LinkedIn. One of Farajallah’s first actions when he joined in March was an urgent operational review that saw the removal of routes such as Aberdeen to Teesside and Newcastle, and Glasgow to Southampton, steps that caused disquiet among regular customers, particularly in the northeast of England.
In an interview with Flightglobal, Farajallah says he regrets the effect on local communities, but that “I took the decision to remove some flying in the name of resilience throughout the rest of the network”. Six months on, he says the decision has paid off, with punctuality improving 8% in August compared with a year earlier, and cancellations down from around 3% of all scheduled flights to less than 1%.
Under Hinkles, Loganair established a reputation as an enthusiastic environmental guinea pig, collaborating with UK start-ups Cranfield Aerospace Solutions (CAeS) and Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV) to commit to trial flights of a hydrogen fuel cell-powered aircraft and a hybrid airship in the Orkney islands, off Scotland’s north coast. It has stated an ambition to be a zero-net-carbon airline by 2040.
His successor insists those undertakings remain in place. “Our priority was getting the operational elements sorted, but none of our environmental initiatives have been put to bed,” he says. In fact, they have grown. In early September Glasgow-headquartered Loganair announced a pact with Swedish hybrid-electric aircraft developer Heart Aerospace to “establish use cases” for such aircraft in its UK network.
Farajallah maintains Loganair is not committing to a single potentially disruptive technology at the expense of others.“We are fishing in a big pool,” he says. “We have a line into sustainable fuel, a line into electric, a line into hydrogen. We are keeping all our options open.”
However, he believes the initiative with Gothenburg-based Heart is arguably the most promising. “I’ve known about them for a long time,” he says. “Their aircraft is not a pipedream; it’s already built. It’s a real aircraft, with real, credible technology and they are already a long way down the track.”
Heart unveiled its full-scale HX-1 flying demonstrator on 12 September. It will serve as a platform for testing and development of the first planned production type, the 30-seat Heart ES-30, scheduled to enter service around 2029 and capable of flying routes of up to 108nm (200km) on battery power alone. However, that extends to 430nm on hybrid power if only 25 passengers are on board, the equivalent of some of Loganair’s highest-profile routes, such as Edinburgh to Southampton. Capacity, however, would be less than on the airline’s Embraer ERJ-145 jets or ATR 72 turboprops.
Loganair’s agreement with CAeS would see the airline operating an adapted Britten-Norman BN-2 Islander, equipped with a hydrogen fuel cell powertrain, in the Orkneys by 2027. Loganair already uses a pair of Islanders to connect remoter parts of the archipelago, off Scotland’s north coast, under a PSO contract with the local council. It says the short routes are the “ideal testbed for the first hydrogen flight”.
The carrier is also part of a consortium that includes airport operator HIAL to explore use cases for the HAV Airlander 10 in the Orkneys and the wider Highlands and Islands, including as a cargo transport. Although early examples of the 10t-payload hybrid airship will have conventional kerosene engines, HAV is working on a variant powered by electric motors.
Farajallah insists Loganair cannot fly solo when it comes to sustainability. “We can’t do this ourselves. We need to work with partners, and airport infrastructure will need to change,” he says. Loganair is holding talks about its environmental aspirations with the Scottish government in the next few weeks. “It’s inconceivable that we’ll take a decision to purchase or lease any aircraft without the necessary infrastructure in place, so collaboration will be necessary,” he adds.
The airline is bringing in a new director of safety and sustainability, Rebecca Borresen, who joins on 1 October. With a background in both the onshore and offshore helicopter sectors, plus a short stint at would-be all-electric regional start-up Ecojet, where she was most recently chief operations officer, Borresen combines experience in safety management and sustainability initiatives.
“It’s vital that we make this link,” says Farajallah, who worked with Borresen at Specialist Aviation Services. Establishing a reputation as a pioneer in climate-friendly aviation is already positively impacting Loganair’s prospects, he adds: “Every time we talk to the travel trade or business communities, the conversation switches almost immediately to how we plan to tick the sustainability box.”
Farajallah – who has also held senior roles with BA CitiExpress and Brymon Airways and been managing director of Bond Offshore Helicopters – says that, while his initial review of the network is complete, “maintaining what we call stable ops is an area that needs constant focus. We can’t ever say we’re over it.”
Helping is the fact that earlier this year Loganair operated its last Saab 340 flight and took delivery of its final ATR – it now has 20 examples of both variants of the Franco-Italian turboprop. One of the main reasons for the disruption in 2023 and early 2024 was that the airline tried to maintain its full timetable as the last of its 18 Saab 340s were being withdrawn before their replacements arrived, says Farajallah. The ATRs operate alongside 10 Embraer ERJ-145s, three De Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otters, and the two Islanders.
With operational stability on its way to being restored, Farajallah says the emphasis will move to expanding or restoring routes, which will “inevitably mean more aircraft”. He says he hopes to return Loganair services to Newcastle and Teesside. “The northeast of England has always been of interest to Loganair and will be going forward,” he says. “Our mission as a company is to connect the regions of the UK to large population centres. We are now starting to be more minded towards growth than we have been for the past three or four months.”
Loganair’s foothold at the UK’s largest airport remains “important”, says Farajallah. It secured its first London Heathrow slots in 2021, after airlines vacated during the pandemic, introducing services to the Isle of Man. It later shifted PSO routes from Dundee and Derry to Heathrow from London City and London Stansted, respectively. The airline also benefits from its codeshare with British Airways, Heathrow’s biggest tenant, allowing Loganair to offer long-haul connections to global destinations from airports served by the flag carrier.
Like many of its counterparts, Loganair has been frustrated by the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency, which has made it harder to source some parts and employ EASA-licensed pilots. Adding to the complication has been the need to retrain existing Saab 340 flightcrew at ATR in Toulouse or recruit experienced ATR pilots. “We’ve made good progress,” says Farajallah. “But any transition between types is complicated and takes pilots away from the flying line.”
He believes that Loganair’s modest size – it employs some 250 pilots out of a total workforce of around 1,000 – makes it an attractive employer. “Like all regional airlines, we tend to lose pilots to the bigger airlines, but we have a loyal workforce who live or have chosen to live in the regions we serve,” he says. “We have a personal relationship with our plots – they are names not numbers to us – which is to do with the fact that we are a family-owned business. Our priority now is to introduce different types of rostering that better reflects the lifestyle of a lot of our pilots.”
Last October, Loganair’s controlling shareholders Stephen and Peter Bond announced that they would remain in charge “for the foreseeable future” a year after declaring that they were looking to sell their stake and had appointed advisors to help find a buyer. They had been involved with the airline for a quarter century, almost half of that as sole owners.
Farajallah admits he has joined an airline that, despite its size, has more than its share of challenges, with four very different aircraft types in its fleet and routes ranging from the world’s shortest scheduled service, a 2min hop from Westray to Papa Westray in the Orkneys, to international flights. While many of its UK-wide routes are used primarily by business and leisure travellers, its Highland and Islands services are often a lifeline for patients attending hospital appointments, students travelling to university, commuting North Sea oil workers, or family members attending funerals. With road and sea connections lengthy and weather dependent, reliability is essential.
“It’s a complex airline and sometimes small airlines can be the most complex,” he says. “But since arriving here I’ve discovered that the passion for what we do is incredible, and that’s why I love it.”