Daily newspapers to be delivered by plane to Stornoway in trial run

DAILY newspapers will soon be available in the morning in Stornoway for the first time in four years.

Loganair is launching a trial run of flying daily papers from Glasgow on weekdays and Sunday. From Monday to Friday the flight touches down in Stornoway airport about 8am while the Sunday flight operates at lunchtime. The test run starats at the beginning of April.

However, the heavier weight of papers and supplements on Saturday will continue to be sent via ferry.

The airline’s chief executive, Jonathan Hinkles, told the council’s transport committee he was confident the trial run would evolve into a permanent service.

“We can’t do it on Saturdays as the plane cannot carry that amount of newspapers,” he explained as 2.4 tonnes of newsprint is designated for Stornoway that day.

On other days passenger seats will be “blocked” to carry the papers. Papers will be carried in the hold but will also have to be spread out in the cabin so the “balance of load remains within limits”.

Until 2013, publishers hired a freight aircraft to fly the dailies from Aberdeen to Stornoway early each morning. POLICE have called off the search for a missing teenage girl after her sister revealed she was safe and well.

It had been thought that Abbey Lewis, 16, who had last been seen on Sunday walking towards Saltcoats station may have travelled to Birmingham to meet someone she had befriended on the internet.

Abbey, from Saltcoats, was reported missing to police on Monday and police in Scotland liaised with colleagues at British Transport Police to check trains and speak to officers in other forces south of the Border.

Her elder sister Samantha Smith wrote on social media: “Thank you to every single person who took time to help in this obviously worrying situation.

“My whole family and myself thank you from the bottom of our hearts.”