Airline boss apologises for islands services

Loganair's chief executive has apologised to customers in Orkney and Shetland for the standard of services last month.

Jonathan Hinkles said high levels of Covid absences among its own and also airport staff had an impact on flights.

He said the airline's on-time performances had been poor and there were delays to its aircraft maintenance programme.

The number of flights leaving on time for Orkney dropped from an average of 89% in January-March to 74% in April.

For Shetland, the on-time performance fell from an average of 80% in January-March to 61% last month.

Mr Hinkles said: "We know this is simply not good enough."

The airline chief said Loganair was committed to delivering services expected of customers, and also that the company had put in a "huge amount" of work to support the communities it served during the pandemic.

Mr Hinkles said: "Early indications are that we are making good progress to restore our strong track record - 89% of flights were on time in the Covid years 2020/21 and 2019, we achieved 87%.

"Those kinds of industry-leading levels are where we strive to be today – and we’re working hard to get there."

Glasgow-based Loganair is marking its 60th anniversary this year.

It has flights from 33 UK airports, including to Aberdeen, Inverness, Dublin, Liverpool and London.