Taking to the water
Seaplanes are back. Two types are re-entering production and new operators include the UK's first amphibious air taxi, servicing Scotland's remote west coast
From Glasgow's post-industrial riverscape - where upmarket apartments, exhibition halls and hotels have long displaced the shipyards - to the idyllic setting of Tobermory on the island of Mull, you are rarely far from water in the west of Scotland. A new floatplane air taxi service - the UK's first - has since October been exploiting the region's most abundant asset to link Glasgow city centre to island and coastal communities, flying from the Clyde to bays, lochs and even conventional airstrips using a nine-seat Cessna 208 Caravan seaplane.
David West, a Cathay Pacific pilot for 20 years, and his wife Susie set up Loch Lomond Seaplanes in 2004 as a sightseeing and charter service based on Loch Lomond, a stretch of water north-west of Glasgow. Permission last year to take off from and land on the Clyde - the service operates from an old dock next to the city's new science centre - provided the opportunity to expand into a fully fledged, single-pilot air taxi operation.
In October the company began daily services to the west Highland resort of Oban, and from March will start flying up to four times a day to Tobermory. It hopes in April to add a service from Leith docks, next to Scotland's capital Edinburgh.
Regular on demand
Because Loch Lomond cannot operate scheduled services, it offers what it calls "regular on-demand flights" pitched at both leisure travellers and those from the business and public sectors. They range, says West, from weekend golfers to Highland estate managers, second honeymooners to central heating engineers.
Return tickets are priced at £149 ($300) to Oban and will be £179 to Tobermory. "We have had no price resistance on that," says West. And, despite Scotland's notoriously temperamental climate, there have been few disruptions, with only 4% of services cancelled because of the weather by mid-December (the company takes a winter break in January and February).
Although British Airways operates government-subsidised services to several island and other remote communities from Glasgow, West says the floatplane establishes a link to areas where there is no market to support a scheduled flight or landing strip sufficient for regional turboprops. This includes Mull, which attracts 400,000 tourists a year, almost all arriving by 5h ferry from Oban. Portree harbour on the Isle of Skye is the next likely destination. "As long as there is a stretch of water, we can land there," he says.
The company can also connect coastal airports with each other so passengers do not have to hub through Glasgow - it regularly flies a charter service, for example, between Tiree and Oban. "We are putting different combinations together and trying to get people to think along different lines to the ones they have been used to," says West.
Public perception
Getting the service up and running took several years of trying. "We didn't know if the great British public would get in a small aeroplane," he says. Putting infrastructure in place has been complicated too. "You've no idea of the number of people we've had to talk to." In Oban, for instance, the aircraft needs to be secured to a pontoon in the bay from where a launch picks up the passengers. On the Clyde, the company must employ a river pilot to check for hazards and clear aircraft movements with the river authority.
In remote landing sites, where there is no harbour master, the pilot simply follows maritime practice. "What it means is that we give way to everybody," says West. Employing pilots has also been a challenge. "Floatplane pilots are a particular breed. The skill levels are very high. I've flown every big jet going, but this is different," he says. "Our two current captains are experienced bush and seaplane pilots and very much at the top of their profession."
Tourism award
With a Scottish tourism authority award newly in the bag and support from the country's government, West feels "we've arrived. We're now seen as a good thing." He says he wants to replicate the success of floatplane services in Alaska and Canada, where they are used "almost like buses to serve remote coastal communities".
The company is also pushing the environmental line. "There are no contrails, no spent fuel in the high atmosphere, no airport to build - just the use of the water and an existing floating pontoon," says West. "If we take three passengers off the road, our flights are carbon neutral."
Loch Lomond Seaplanes is in the market for two more aircraft - a second Caravan and a de Havilland Canada Beaver for the Leith service, where the water distance available is not sufficient for a Caravan. It also has a Cessna 206 Stationair for charter and tour work. The expansion will see the company take on another four pilots and West says that at some point he will quit his job and run the company full time. Eventually he expects the business to "mushroom" to a fleet of 10 aircraft in five years.
There is a huge latent demand for the service, he says, with high-end tourism and commuting being the big drivers. "The west coast is about to explode," he says. "Everybody wants to live there but not to be cut off from the city. What we are also doing is taking to the region the short break market, which has never made it past Edinburgh and Glasgow. With us you can come to Scotland for the weekend and walk on Goat Fell [mountain] on Arran and be back in Glasgow for dinner and a concert."
Detours included
Loch Lomond's pilots are encouraged to change route or altitude, depending on the weather (all flying is VFR), to "enhance the passenger experience," says West. "They might go a couple of miles off route to see a great castle. When the Corryvreckan whirlpool between Jura and Scarba is in full flow, our pilots will make the 10 mile [18km] detour. It might add a couple of minutes but it gives the passengers a memory for life. We are putting some fun, romance and humanity back into flying."
Source: Flight International
