A small, advanced propeller: all about Air Haifa's new plane

 Yesterday, the first plane of Air Haifa landed at the northern airport, receiving lukewarm responses online, mainly due to the small model with "propellers" that reminded people of old planes. However, this is a new and advanced plane.

The new Air Haifa plane is made by the American aerospace firm Pratt & Whitney, model ATR-72-600. It's a small plane because the runway at Haifa Airport is only 1,326 meters long, allowing only small planes to take off and land.

For comparison, Ben-Gurion Airport has three runways: the main and largest runway 08/26, which is 4,062 meters long. Runway 12/30 is 3,112 meters long, and the small runway 03/21 is 1,780 meters long. A Boeing 767-300, for example, "Wing of Zion," which the prime minister flies in, requires a runway of 2,410 meters.

The new Air Haifa plane has two engines manufactured by Pratt & Whitney and was manufactured by ATR, owned by the French company Airbus and the Italian company Leonardo. It is designed specifically for short and medium flights and is known as one of the most efficient and fuel-saving planes in its category.

The plane has a maximum capacity of 72 seats and is very popular among civilian airlines worldwide. Its maximum flight range is 1,665 kilometers, allowing it to reach several destinations in the region, including:

• Larnaca, Paphos in Cyprus
• Rhodes, Crete, Thessaloniki, and possibly Athens in Greece
• Antalya, Dalaman, Bodrum, and Istanbul in Turkey
• Eilat

Air Haifa's restrictions

These destinations are theoretical, of course, and depend on aviation agreements between Israel and the destination countries. The plane reaches a maximum altitude of 25,000 feet, approximately 7,620 meters. For comparison, a Boeing 767 reaches a maximum altitude of 41,000 feet.

The crew includes two pilots. The passenger cabin has a legroom of 76 cm, similar to other planes of its size. The plane does not have an individual entertainment system or TV screens, but for short flight distances, this is unnecessary.

The plane's "propeller" engines remind people of old planes, which caused amusement among online viewers who saw the first pictures of the plane over the weekend. These are Turboprop engines, a type of jet engine where the turbine drives a propeller instead of directly propelling the plane by expelling hot gases.

Propellers are more efficient than regular jet engines on short and medium flights, providing more thrust at lower speeds, making them more suitable for short distances, more fuel-efficient than regular jet engines, and therefore reducing their operating costs. Propellers don't mean the plane is inferior: although regular jet engines like those on Boeing or Airbus planes are faster on long flights, propeller planes have attractive fuel efficiency, are cheaper, and are equipped with noise reduction technologies, unlike propellers of the past.