Air New Zealand Air Points - End of An Era - Last SAAB 340 Flight

Yesterday was Air Nelson's last passenger SAAB 340 flight.
NZ8161 WLG-NSN (ZK-NLH).
Kiwi Flyer and I have been keeping an eye on the SAAB fleet and now they have finally been replaced with the Dash 8-300Q.
Oh they were to have finished flying earlier but we surmised that certain problems with B1900Ds may have casued the service to be extended a little longer.;)

Always sad to see the end of a series of planes in any airline.

Except maybe the A330's at Qantas, oh wait they aren't going anywhere :(

Never flew on the SAAB with Air NZ but had two flights with Air Rarotonga on them. Not a bad little aircraft!

Funny thing flying on US, many flyers seem to prefer the Saab 340 over the Dash-8. My home airport is only Dash-8 service....but I have used it to connect to NZ 744 service before :0)

Hopefully your Dash-8s are more comfortable than mine!

I do prefer the saab as I always get an "A" seat.

Are the Dash 8s as squeezy as the Saabs are/were? While I'm quite fond of the Saabs and I always enjoyed the single 'A' seats, I did find the amount of personal space very limited. The ATRs on the other hand seem to be significantly more comfortable, so I just assumed the Dash 8s would be similar...

Dash 8 is in between ATR and Saab in terms of comfort. Row 1 is tighter than the other rows, because of the tray table, and on left hand side the mini bulkhead/edge of door.

Most of the time they have the arm rests up in the other rows.