LHR to LDY Loganair Economy

Airline:  Loganair

Flight #: LM652

Route:    LHR-LDY

Class:    Economy

Seat:     12A

Date:     Wednesday 31^st May 2023

The end of May saw me preparing for another trip with this one planned to tick off the final one of the four constituent nations of the United Kingdom that I was yet to visit, Northern Ireland. Rather than undertake the ‘usual’ trip to Belfast, I had decided to do something different and head to Derry/Londonderry. As such my trip began at Heathrow for a morning flight across the Irish Sea with Loganair.

Having stayed the night at one of the hotels on Heathrow’s northern perimeter, I decided to walk five minutes to a bus stop to catch a regular London bus into the Central Bus Station as this cost £1.60 as opposed to the £6.80 via the ‘Hotel Hoppa’ bus direct from the hotel. Arriving at Heathrow’s Terminal 2 around 0615, I had a 15-minute wait until check-in opened just over two hours before our scheduled departure.

Other than having to take my rucksack to the ‘oversize baggage’ desk (I’m not sure whether this was just the process for Loganair flights or whether it was owing to me having a rucksack), both check-in and security were painless, and I was through to the departure lounge about 10 minutes after check-in had opened. Initially heading to the Fullers pub for a full breakfast, I then settled down next to one of the many large windows to pass the time with some plane spotting.

A highlight of my time spotting was the pair of JetBlue Airbus A321neos which were being prepared for departures to Boston Logan and New York JFK. There was also plenty of other interesting aircraft and airlines around including Saudia, Qantas and Ethiopian Airlines, with the Airbus A350 belonging to the latter being moved over to the remote stands to await its evening departure back to Addis Abba.

As with the majority of flights, the gate for my flight was announced about 40 minutes before our scheduled departure and so I headed downstairs in the main part of Terminal 2 to find the bus gates and gate A5. Unfortunately, at this point a short delay to our flight was announced and so we were ‘pre-boarded’ into a holding area to await the arrival of a bus to take us to the aircraft.

At 0848, three minutes after our scheduled departure time, the bus departed the gate to take us to the aircraft. Parked on stand 253L, a remote stand beyond Terminal 2B, was G-SAJC, a 22-year-old Embraer ERJ145 which would be taking us across the Irish Sea. Despite being the largest of Embraer’s ‘ERJ’ family, the ERJ145 looks tiny within the surroundings of Heathrow, especially when parked next to Ethiopian Airlines’ Airbus A350.

Loganair have their ERJ145s configured to carry 49 passengers in an all-economy cabin, with seats arranged in a 1-2 config either side of the aisle. Compared to the economy seating on most short-haul flights, I was impressed with the amount of legroom provided onboard although the narrower cabin did mean the seats appeared to be narrower than normal. With just 24 of the 49 seats filled, there was plenty of space onboard, although everyone with a wheeled cabin bag had been required to have these put in the hold for the flight as the overhead lockers are quote small.

With boarding complete I was hopeful that we would be soon departing, however unfortunately we were further delayed waiting for the flight plan to be accepted and for a slot to be granted for departure. As we waited G-LMRB, one of Loganair’s ATR42-500s, arrived from Dundee and looked even more miniscule as it parked between us and the Ethiopian A350.

A highlight of this flight with Loganair was the excellent service provided by our flight attendant, Megan, who came around during the delay offering out bottles of water and a choice of shortbread or a caramel wafer. Amusingly, I noticed during this round of service that one of the catering trays was labelled with ‘Jersey European’ branding, an airline that hasn’t existed since 2000 when it became British European and later Flybe.

Pushback finally came at 0947 and from our stand we had a fairly lengthy taxi to the western end of the airport in preparation for a departure from runway 09R. Lining up for departure after the departure of G-VFAN, one of Virgin Atlantic’s Boeing 787-9s, operating VS5 to Miami, we took off at 1010 and we soon heading up through the clouds.

A quick turn after departure and we were initially heading north until we were around Luton before another turn had us flying north-west. Passing over Northampton, Derby and southern Manchester, we crossed the coast over the Lancashire town of Southport before overflying the Isle of Man. Crossing over the Northern Irish coast to the south-east of Belfast, the sea of clouds began to clear and we got some great views of Northern Ireland’s stunning scenery.

One slight negative to the journey was the level of ambient noise within the ERJ145, with the cabin being very loud and making me glad of my noise cancelling headphones. As we reached cruising altitude, Megan once again came round offering another snack along with tea, coffee or water. Given most European airlines have now scrapped all complementary catering onboard, it was a nice surprise to get this offering, however limited, from Loganair and certainly helps set them apart.

Our approach into the City of Derry airport had us crossing the River Foyle and briefly into the Republic of Ireland, before a turn brought us back over Derry/Londonderry and onto final approach to runway 08. Touching down at 1110, we’d recovered some of our initial delay and arrived in Northern Ireland exactly an hour later than scheduled. With only one other aircraft (a business jet) on the apron, the airport was extremely quiet as we walked across the tarmac from the aircraft to the terminal.

The arrivals process was extremely quick and by the time we had walked into the terminal and taken the opportunity to use the facilities, the checked bags were arriving on the only carousel and I was soon walking through to the landside area of the terminal. One thing to take into account if flying into the City of Derry airport is the limited public transport links, with a bus running every 2-3 hours during the day and not timed to meet arriving flights. In fact, if we’d been on time, the bus would have left for the city six minutes before we landed.

With this being my first flight with Loganair, I wasn’t sure what to expect but overall, I was impressed. Unfortunately, the delay took the shine off of things, but the service and general impression of the airline was positive. As we landed I was looking forward to seeing if my flight back a couple of days later would give me the same impression.

Lounge              0*

Seat/Facilities     4*

Food               3*

Service             5*

Punctuality         1*

Overall Rating      13/25 (read about my rating system here!)