Daher’s turboprop TBM 930 is seeing increasing use in charter services, the company announced at the NBAA Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition on Monday. California-based charter company Mountain Lion Aviation purchased the first 930 to see use as a charter in December 2017. Mountain Lion says it has flown the aircraft for roughly 430 hours, carrying a total of 475 passengers on approximately 300 commercial flights in the last ten months.
“We salute the TBM 930’s successful charter introduction by Mountain Lion Aviation, which has accumulated an impressive first year of activity,” said Daher Aircraft President Nicolas Chabbert. “This is a clear indication that our very fast turboprop has an important role to play in the point-to-point air charter market.” According to Chabbert, there are now 10 charter operations—flying a total of 17 aircraft—using TBMs worldwide.
The single-engine TBM 930 has a 1,730-NM range, 330 knot maximum cruise speed and 1,400-pound payload. The 2018 model has some upgrades on previous years, including SurfaceWatch aural and visual alerts for the aircraft’s G3000 flight deck, baro-VNAV approach and visual approach guidance mode and a FS510 Wi-Fi streaming system to provide flight information to mobile devices. On the passenger side, 2018 upgrades include heated seats and more USB ports.
