Alaska Airlines yesterday retired the last Dash 8 Q-400 from its fleet, after more than two decades of continuous operation of aircraft from the popular regional turboprop family. The company had announced last March that it would replace the airplanes, operated by Horizon Air, with Embraer E175 aircraft.
The aircraft, registration N421QX, completed its last commercial passenger service for Horizon Air between Seattle-Tacoma (SEA) and Portland (PDX) airports. It took off at 21:09 local time on Thursday and landed at 21:40 covering flight AS 9986.
Fleet modernisation and simplification
The measure is part of a process of modernisation and standardisation of the fleet. According to the company, during 2023 it will also deprogram its Airbus A320 family aircraft to have a fleet composed exclusively of Boeing and Embraer aircraft.
During their years of operation for the airline, the Dash 8 Q-100, Q200 and Q400 played a key role in air connectivity in the Pacific Northwest region.
The process of retiring the Q400 had begun about a year earlier, when the airline had a total of 32 aircraft of the type, seven of them under lease. Alaska Airlines is now looking to sell the aircraft to other interested operators.
The Q400 joined Horizon Air’s fleet following the merger of Alaska Airlines and Virgin America in 2016, as did the Airbus A321neo, which will also be phased out starting this year. The carrier currently holds firm orders for Embraer 175, Boeing 737 MAX 8, 737 MAX 9 and 737 MAX 10 aircraft.
“We are commemorating an airplane”, said Joe Sprague, president of Horizon Air. “But we are celebrating the people who made that airplane so positively impactful for Alaska Air Group, Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air”, he added.
See also: End of an era: The last Boeing 747 ever built will be delivered on January 31
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