According to a release yesterday, "Porter Airlines tees up winter Myrtle Beach service", planned service between Myrtle Beach Airport and the Toronto Island Airport is intended to be a non-stop flight.

The distance between the island airport and the Myrtle Beach airport is 597 nautical miles, 97 nautical miles over the manufacturer’s specification for Porter’s Q400 – which is limited, according to its manufacturer, to 500 nm flights.

"We originally raised this issue when we noticed that Bombardier’s specifications for the Q400 required almost 200 meters more than the longest runway at the Island Airport for takeoffs. It responded by creating a new "500 nautical mile sector" Q400 category, with a reduced number of passengers, and a maximum flight length of 500 nm. But these flights wil be over that 500 nm limit. What assurance will Porter’s Myrtle Beach passengers have that Porter is not cutting corners with these flights?" said Brian Iler, Chair, CommunityAIR.

The Island Airport’s too-short runway has been a continuing concern: CommunityAIR has raised this before – see the attached letter of September 14, 2007 to Prime Minister Harper..

And the combination of a too-short runway and inadequate runway safety areas heightens our concern, given the real-life example of a ComAir Q400 running off a runway 818 meters longer than that at the Toronto Island airport last August – see our August 18 Press Release, attached.

CommunityAIR raised this question last week with Mark McQueen, chair of the Toronto Port Authority. He did not respond.

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Originally, the manufacturer of Porter’s Q400) stated that the longest runway at the island airport was unsuitable for a fully loaded Q400: take-off or landing. sector flight:

The Island Airport’s longest runway is 1220 m

After CommunityAIR raised this concern a new entry appear on the Bombardier website, creating a new "500 nautical mile sector" Q400, with reduced number of passengers, and a maximum flight length of 500 nm, to reduce the aircraft’s weight sufficiently to land and takeoff without too high a safety risk:

See Q400 specifications at: http://www2.bombardier.com/q400/en/specifications.jsp