An island MP has called for a full review of safety procedures at Loganair after a pilots raised serious concerns with company bosses.
An internal letter from pilots’ union Balpa’s company council, sent to Loganair chief executive Stewart Adams last week, complained that planes were “being returned to the line despite being unserviceable” and in some cases “aircraft retain defects that clearly affect flight safety”.
Mr Adams said that the safety of passengers and staff “is and always be our number one priority”.
But northern isles MP Alistair Carmichael said that it was “an extremely serious development” and called for an immediate review by the Civil Aviation Authority.
It follows the two-page letter which outlines major concerns pilots have about Loganair’s engineering department, which has contributed to the troubled airline delivering an “appalling” service to passengers. It describes morale as being “at the lowest ebb ever witnessed by many employees”.
Balpa questions the effectiveness of measures put in place since Loganair belatedly acknowledged its poor performance, which has seen one in four flights delayed by 15 minutes or more in 2015.
Mr Carmichael said: “This is an extremely serious development. Pilots publicly questioning the safety of their aircraft is unprecedented in my experience and needs to be taken seriously.
“The Civil Aviation Authority is responsible for aviation safety in the UK and so they must implement an immediate review of Loganair’s aircraft and engineering services.”
Loganair chief executive Stewart Adams said: “First and foremost, let me make it absolutely clear that the safety of our crews and passengers is and always will be our number one priority.
“The final decision on whether or not a flight departs is always in the hands of the pilot, and we know that none of our pilots would ever leave the ground if he or she had any safety concerns.”
He added: “We are always open to discussing matters of concern with our flight crews, and have responded quickly to both Balpa and the pilot representatives with an offer to meet with them at the earliest opportunity to address their issues in detail.
“Moving on to engineering, there have been issues, with a number of experienced employees leaving or retiring and having to be replaced.
“The process of training their replacements to work with the very specialised aircraft that fly on Loganair routes takes time, but we are now well into this process.”