Belfast International Airport

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Belfast International Airport Template:Airport codes is an airport located some 24 kilometres (15 miles) west of Belfast in Northern Ireland. It is also known as Aldergrove, after the village of that name lying immediately to the west of the airport. Belfast International shares its runways with the Royal Air Force base RAF Aldergrove, which otherwise has its own facilites. It is the busiest airport in Northern Ireland. However, since the move of both British Airways and BMI to the smaller Belfast City Airport (which is closer to Belfast) Belfast International is served predominantly by 'no-frills' airlines.

1 Timeline
2 Key facts
3 Airlines and destinations
4 External link

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Timeline

November 1917: Aldergrove selected to be the Royal Flying Corps training establishment during the First World War. With the end of the war, Aldergrove remained open for Royal Air Force aircraft and for the fledgling civil traffic to and from Northern Ireland.
June 1921: King George V and Queen Mary visited Northern Ireland. Aircraft landed at Aldergrove with cameramen and reporters and returned to London with newsreel films and photographs of the event.
May 1925: Northern Ireland's own Special Reserve unit No 502 (Ulster) Squadron RAF was formed at Aldergrove.
31 May 1933: Northern Ireland's first ever regular, sustained civil air service started. The route was Glasgow to Aldergrove and the flight was operated by Midland and Scottish Air Ferries.
1933-1934: Aldergrove became Northern Ireland's civil airport.
20 August 1934: Northern Ireland's first London service began to Nutts Corner, operated by Railway Air Services. The flight left from Croydon and went via Birmingham and Manchester to Belfast.
1939-45: During the second World War, Aldergrove remained an RAF base, particularly for the Coastal Command.
1946-63: Nutts Corner becomes the main civil airport of Northern Ireland.
26 Sept 1963: The decision was taken to move civil flights back to Aldergrove because of less variable weather conditions than those at Nutts Corner. In recent years aircraft had been diverted from Nutts Corner to Aldergrove because of adverse weather conditions. The first passenger flight to land that day was a BEA Vickers Viscount from Manchester.
28 October 1963: HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother reopened Aldergrove as a civil airport and inaugurated the terminal building which, as of 2006, is still in use as one part of a considerably larger complex.
4 January 1966: The start of the first regular jet service, by a British United BAC 1-11 to Gatwick
1969: Annual passenger numbers hit the 1 million mark
11 September 2001: Transatlantic aircraft including a BA 747 are diverted to Aldergrove following the closure of United States airspace.
2005: Continental Airlines began direct flights from Aldergrove to Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey, United States.

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Key facts

Serving over 4.5 million passengers a year, Belfast International Airport is the principal gateway to Northern Ireland.
The airport operates 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and is not subject to noise abatement procedures, significant environmental constraints or airspace limitations.
Most techically advanced airport in Ireland- Two long runways with ILS Cat 111b equipment, offer wide-body capacity.
Fifth largest regional air cargo centre in the UK.
Full range of warehouse and distribution centre.
Extensive ancillary services on site including executive air charter, air taxi, air ambulance, helicopter training and hire.

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Airlines and destinations

The following scheduled airlines use Belfast International Airport (at April 2006):

bmibaby (Birmingham (UK), Cardiff, Manchester (UK), Nottingham)
Continental Airlines (Newark)
easyJet (Alicante, Amsterdam, Berlin-Schönefeld, Bristol, Edinburgh, Faro, Geneva, Glasgow, Inverness, Liverpool, London-Gatwick, London-Luton, London-Stansted, Malaga, Newcastle, Nice, Palma, Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Rome-Ciampino)
Jet2.com (Barcelona, Blackpool, Leeds/Bradford, Murcia, Pisa, Prague, Tenerife South (from Oct 2006))
Zoom Airlines (Toronto, Vancouver (both from May 2006))

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