Sundt Air has purchased a King Air B200 after securing a contract with the Norwegian CAA for calibration work. Marketing director Olav Vollestad said: “The contract was signed just before the end of last year and after that we went out and bought the aircraft.

“There will be a great deal of work for the B200, because Norway has an unbelievable amount of airports (around 50). This will be flying all the way up to Spitzbergen, which is the northernmost airport in the world. In total it will be doing around 700 flight hours a year, which is more than enough to occupy one aircraft.”

All airports in the country have a twice-annual routine, where everything has to be inspected and calibrated. “If there is an incident at an airport it can be closed until we have been down to check all the instruments, so this is a very important job. Prior to this the Norwegian CAA used a Dash 8, but it worked out to be too expensive,” said Vollestad.

Sundt Air owns seven aircraft and manages a Challenger 604. “Our own fleet includes four Citation 650s, a Citation Excel and a second Beech King Air.

“We try to employ our aircraft with long-term contracts from large corporations if possible. In my opinion it's crucial to secure this type of work if you want to survive as a Norwegian operator, as it’s very difficult to sell your capacity day by day,” said Vollestad.

The B200 will be based at Oslo Airport, generally flying out on a Monday morning and returning

on a Friday. “This was a good niche to get into because we knew the aircraft would have guaranteed flight hours every year. The B200 is ideal for this type of work because it’s a very economic, solid and reliable aircraft, which can land on short airstrips.”

The King Air is currently in Germany being installed with the necessary measuring equipment, before it starts flying on April 1.