Gallery: Austrian Airlines Bids Farewell To Last Dash 8 Turboprop

The Dash 8 turboprop (OE-LGI) featured the words in Northern Austria dialect, “Pfiat di, Dash!” which means goodbye and God protect you!

In the late 1980s, a Tyrolean Airways Dash 7 sits at Courchevel Airport in the French Alps. The airfield is located within the skiing area. A 535-meter (1,755 ft.) runway goes downhill on an 18.5 degree slope. Only specially qualified pilots have been allowed to operate from this airfield.

The Dash 7 at Courchevel Airport. The takeoff returning to Innsbruck felt like we were ski jumping. Tyrolean was the only airline to operate from this airport.

The first Dash-8-200 joined Tyrolean Airways in 1985; in 1991, the larger Dash 8-300 variant arrived and in May 2000 its first Dash 8 Q400 joined the fleet. This aircraft, OE-LGA, awaits its delivery to Austria in early June 2000 in Toronto.

OE-LGA sits at the Bombardier factory in Toronto, Canada. Tyrolean Airways (Austrian Airlines) operated a total of 18 Dash 8 Q400s.

The Dash 7 and 8 fleet flew 237 million km (147 million mi.), transporting 20.4 million passengers.

May 31, 2021, marked the end of an era for turboprop aircraft operations for Lufthansa subsidiary Austrian Airlines.

The Vienna-Innsbruck service has been one of the main routes for the turboprops over the past 41 years. Here, the pilot makes a right turn during approach into Innsbruck Airport in Tyrol, which gives passengers a spectacular mountain view.

The same right turn. However, strong foehn winds, which are quite common in this region, presents a challenge for pilots, but Tyrolean/Austrian pilots became very skilled when operating in and out of this airport in the Alps.

Austrian Airlines staff and Tyrolean Airways former staff gather to bid farewell to the Dash 8-400, which operated to this airport.

In the mid-1980s, Tyrolean Airways became one of the leading regional carriers in Europe. In 1998, it received the ATW Regional Airline of the Year award. In this picture from the early years are (from left) Jakob Ringler, who ordered the first Dash 7 in 1978; Manfred Helldoppler, who had several management positions; CCO Josef Burger; and (far right) CEO Fritz Feitl.

Onboard service on the Dash 8-400. The average flight time of a Dash rotation has been 53 min. Flight attendants served 2.6 million cups of coffee.

The cockpit crew completed the final scheduled service in Vienna.

The turboprop’s PW150A engine.

Farewell ceremony in Vienna.

A Dash 8-400 sits in an Austrian Airlines hangar for the final time. Together, all 60 Dash aircraft—18 Dash 8-400s, 17 Dash 8-100s, 22 Dash 8-300s and three Dash 7s—have spent 54 years in the air.