Osmani International Airport

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Osmani International Airport

IATA: ZYL - ICAO: VGSY
Summary
Airport type		Public
Operator		Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh
Serves		Sylhet
Elevation AMSL		50 ft (15 m)
Coordinates		24°57′48″N, 91°52′01″E
Runways
Direction	Length		Surface
Direction	ft	m	Surface
11/29	9,478	2,889	Asphalt

Osmani International Airport (IATA: ZYL, ICAO: VGSY) serves Bangladesh's north-eastern city of Sylhet and the Division of Sylhet which comprises the districts Habiganj, Moulvibazar, Sunamganj and Sylhet.

1 History
2 Airlines and destinations
3 References
4 External links

[edit] History

Osmani International Airport was built during British rule of the Indian Subcontinent, partly to check Japanese aggression from Burma.

The airport was formerly known as Sylhet Civil Airport but was re-named after General M A G Osmani, a Bangladeshi Independence War hero. General Osmani was born in Sylhet in 1918 and served as the Supreme Commander of the Mukti Bahini (Freedom Force) and Bangladesh Armed Forces during the Bangladesh Liberation War.

The airport was initially served by domestic flights from Zia International Airport by the country's national airline Biman Bangladesh Airlines. After many years of lobbying by expatriates living in the UK, limited expansion of the airport was carried out to enable medium-sized aircraft, such as the Airbus A310 operated by Biman, to land. The work was completed in October 2002 and the airport was designated as an International airport by the government. However, this was just a move to stave off pressure from the government as the airport was not up to international standards to be capable of fully accommodating international flights due to many shortcomings including the fact that the runway lighting system did not meet the necessary ICAO standards for a precision runway.

On 3 November 2002, the airport received its first international arrival. Biman flight BG020 from Kuwait via Abu Dhabi landed at 10:05 with 215 passengers en-route to Dhaka.^[1] The disembarking passengers on the inaugraul flight were greeted by then Finance & Planning Minister, M Saifur Rahman and State Minister for Civil Aviation and Tourism, Mir Mohammad Nasiruddin.

Additional expansion of the runway and improvements to the runway lighting and airport facilities were commenced in 2004 to enable wide-bodied aircraft to safely land and takeoff from the airport.^[2]^[3]

It is interesting to note that with all the previous expansion works, no other wide-bodied aircraft (apart from the Airbus's operated by Biman) have landed at the airport.

The 2006 South Asia Transport and Trade Facilitation Conference report (by the US Trade and Development Agency) noted that the development of the airport "up to the standards of [an] international airport" to "encourage private sector participation in air transport" were projects that were under consideration by the government.^[4]

Work finally started in 2006 to upgrade the terminal facilities to enable handling of international flights using wide-bodied aircraft. The improvements include construction of a new terminal building, a Jetway and a taxi-way (currently the sole runway is used for taxiing).^[5] The work is scheduled for completion in June 2007 but is running behind schedule.^[6]