Canada’s Swoop Begins Boeing 737 MAX Flights This Week

Simple Flying

By James Pearson

Published Jun 7, 2022

Canadian ULCC Swoop is about to start using the B737 MAX 8.

Photo: Swoop (note that this is a B737-800 and not a MAX 8).

Swoop's first commercial B737 MAX 8 flight is set to take off on June 10th, this coming Friday, from Edmonton to Victoria. It'll grow to 15 flights a day by the end of June. When writing, MAX operations are visible until the end of the month.According to Planespotters.net, Swoop now has two MAX 8s, registered C-GJKK and C-GORP, both originally destined for Norwegian. Like the remaining four MAX aircraft to be delivered and its ten-strong fleet of B737-800s, all have 189 seats.

Take off on June 10th

Swoop's first B737 MAX 8 service will be from Edmonton (YEG on the map below) to Victoria (YYJ). That's based on Cirium data and is reflected in Google Flights. It isn't shown on Swoop's website, which simply states '737-800' for every flight.

Flight WO209 will leave YEG at 06:55 and arrive in YYJ at 07:30 local time. Returning, WO210 will depart at 08:15 and return at 10:45. After 2h 20m on the ground, WO264 will leave the Alberta airport for Halifax (YHZ) – 2,295 miles (3,693km) away – at 13:05 and arrive at 20:45 local. After a 45-minute turn, WO265 will take off at 21:30 and arrive back at 23:50.

On that first day, the MAX 8 will have a block time of 13h 5m. It'll have only four sectors, but block hours are well above the 12 hours often considered minimal for ULCCs.

Swoop's first B737 MAX flight. Of course, things could change. Image: Google Images.

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Where is the MAX flying in June?

As shown in the map below, many domestic routes will see the MAX 8 this month. While Toronto Pearson to Edmonton will have more MAX flights than any other airport pair, a good number will welcome the type only once. Examples are below, including Deer Lake, Moncton, and Saint John, airports which Swoop inaugurated very recently.

Toronto (YYZ) to Regina (YQR; on the 22nd)
YYZ to Saint John (YSJ; 23rd)
YYZ to Deer Lake (YDF; 24th)
Hamilton (YHM) to Charlottetown (YYG; 27th)
YHM to St. John (YYT; 27th),
YHM to Abbotsford (YXX; 29th)
YEG to Moncton (YQM; 20th)
YEG to London (YXU; 21st)
YEG to Comox (YQQ; 23rd)
YEG to Ottawa (YOW; 27th)

Swoop's MAX routes in June. The map is a bit hard to read. Note that changes may occur and that some routes have very few services by the type. Image: Cirium.

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Come June 30th...

When writing, Swoop plans 15 MAX flights on June 30th; expect at least one more aircraft to be delivered very soon. The day begins with a 00:35 departure from YEG to YYZ, organized below by local departure time. One-stops are in bold: