Sunday 23 August 2015

JAPAN: Amakusa Airlines Introduces First ATR 42-600 To Japan

Amakusa Airlines-AMX (Amakusa, Kunamoto Prefecture, Japan) has taken delivery in Toulouse of a 48-seat ATR 42-600 (JA01AM, msn 1202), the first of the type to start operations in Japan.

For almost 15 years, the airline has been providing regular scheduled regional services connecting the city of Amakusa off the coast of mainland Kyushu in southwestern Japan to large cities such as Kumamoto, Fukuoka, and Osaka.

This new ATR 42-600 has been purchased from Nordic Aviation Capital (NAC), the industry’s largest turboprop lessor, headquartered in Denmark. It is equipped with the latest technologies in passenger comfort and navigation aid tools and features ATR’s newest Armonia cabin (below) and full-glass cockpit avionics.

With the introduction of this very first ATR aircraft in Japan, Amakusa will replace their current 39-seat turboprop (below), thus offering larger capacity and contributing to the development of tourism and to even better service for the local population.

Commenting on the introduction of the aircraft, Takashi Yoshimura President of Amakusa Airlines, declared:
“We are honored to debut the ATR in Japan, and to provide our passengers with an aircraft that has an outstanding reputation in terms of comfort, reliability and operational flexibility. The aircraft, which has an increased seat capacity, will also enable us to achieve optimized economics and seat costs, while having a very low environmental footprint.”

Amakusa Airlines was established in late 1998 and started operations on March 23, 2000, with services from Amakusa to Fukuoka and Kumamoto. Amakusa Airlines is the smallest airline in Japan, with one single aircraft, and is mainly owned by the Kumamoto prefectural government and the municipal government of Amakusa. Since the beginning of its operations, Amakusa Airlines has carried over 1 million passengers.

The new ATR 42-600 replaces an older Bombardier DHC-8-103 (below) (Kampala21).

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