The country of Greenland currently doesn’t see any service on anything larger than turboprop aircraft outside of its hometown airline Air Greenland, but that is all about to change come July 2024 with a major aircraft upguage from Icelandair.
Icelandair is currently the only airline that serves the country at all other than Air Greenland. Currently, Icelandair operates year-round service from its Reykjavik/Keflavik hub to Nuuk and Kulusuk and also offers seasonal service to Ilulissat and Narsarsuaq. All of the service is currently operated on the De Havilland Canada Dash-8-200, mostly due to short runways around the country.
Narsarsuaq is a popular summer destination and is currently one of only two airports in the country that do see scheduled flights on jet aircraft, with the other being Kangerlussuaq. The latter is expected to be phased out as a major connecting point once the new longer runway opens in Nuuk this coming November and jet service will also likely cease too.
Icelandair had planned to operate one of its two weekly flights from Iceland to Narsarsuaq on the slightly larger Q400, but it just got a major upgrade and is now scheduled to be flown on its Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft.
Once the carrier starts its summer seasonal flight in July of 2024, the Saturday flights will be operated using a 737 MAX, while the Tuesday flights will continue to be the much smaller, Dash-8~200.
Although the Boeing 737-800 variant does serve the country with JetTime operating flights for Air Greenland, this will be the first time a 737 MAX will have scheduled flights in the country. This will not be the largest narrowbody aircraft to serve the country or Narsarsuaq as Air Greenland did operate its Boeing 757 in the past before selling the type in 2009. However, this will be the largest narrowbody to currently offer scheduled flights to the country.
Once the longer runway opens later this year in Nuuk, this major aircraft upgrade could be a sign of what is to come in Nuuk, not just for Icelandair but also for other carriers. Currently, the largest aircraft that can operate from the airport is the Dash-8~200.
