PRIMI ANNI 80

01This first half of the 1980s is a period of great work for Saab (for some years it was the customer with the highest turnover), flight connections with Trollhatan in Sweden and Uusikaupunki in Finland were few and involved long stopovers.
Adding to that Ford,  with their offices in Cologne and London and occassionally trips to Istanbul and Bursa for work with Tofas, in 1985  Stola decided to buy a private aircraft.
It was a Cheyenne III PA-42 72R, 9 seater equipped with two 720 hp  Pratt & Whitney turbo-prop engines, a pressurized cabin, a cruising height of 10,700 m, cruising speed of 523 kmh and a range of 4207 km I -CGTO registered.
The captain was Franco Giordano and his co-pilot Alfredo Stola, who had qualified for instrument flight certification (IFR)  a few years earlier.

 

 

02July 24, 1985 Gothenburg, Sven Solvang and Guido Toninelli.03July 24, 1985 Gothenburg Alfredo Stola in the cockpit of the PA-42 I-CGTO

041987 Alfredo and Maria Paola Stola at the General Aviation of the Turku airport in Finland.

05November 6, 1988 flying to Istanbul. Maria Paola Stola and Alfredo.

06November 6, 1988 in flight from Turin to Istanbul.

07November 6, 1988 Bosphorus dinner Roberto Stola and Jean Nauhm Executive Director Tofas.

081989 Torino Colonia with Renzo Zampicinini
and Alberto Sasso.

091989 At General Aviation of Cologne before the return flight. Alfredo Stola in one of the last photographs with the Cheyenne III.

It is interesting to remember that during the 9000 and 900 projects, both Coupé and Cabriolet made a lot of cargo flights  to both Gothenburg and  Turku.
Removing the seats in order to deliver the prototypes of the rear spoilers to allow the Saab to complete their first series.
These exceptional deliveries were required due to  delays accumulated by Saab itself in building the assembly lines for the pre-production to final production cars.
In 1989, the aircraft was sold due to  operating costs as well as to  the fact that year after year, air links from Turin were continually improving.
It was however a nice experience that allowed Alfredo to accumulate just over a thousand hours of flight between 1980 and 1990 not only with the Cheyenne III, but also with his Cessna 172 RG Cutlass.