Yeager Airport

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Yeager Airport
IATA: CRW - ICAO: KCRW - FAA: CRW
Summary
Airport type Public
Operator Central West Virginia Regional Airport Authority
Serves Charleston, West Virginia
Elevation AMSL 981 ft (299 m)
Coordinates 38°22′23″N, 81°35′35″W
Runways
Direction Length Surface
ft m
5/23 6,302 1,921 Asphalt
15/33 4,750 1,448 Asphalt

Yeager Airport (IATA: CRW, ICAO: KCRW, FAA LID: CRW) is a public airport located three miles (5 km) east of the central business district (CBD) of Charleston, a city in Kanawha County, West Virginia, USA. The airport covers 767 acres and has two runways. It is also home to the 9 C-130s from the 130th Airlift Wing.

First-time passengers who watch their planes approach the airport may feel uneasy; the airport sits on a hilltop over 300 feet (about 100 m) above the valleys of the Elk and Kanawha Rivers, and the hill drops off sharply on all sides. Some pilots who regularly fly into the airport liken landing at Yeager to landing on an aircraft carrier, even keeping in mind the fact that aircraft carriers move with the seas while Yeager is stationary.

Contents

[edit] History

During World War II, Charleston's airport at that time, Wertz Field, closed when the airport's approaches were blocked once the federal government built a synthetic rubber plant next to the airport; this left the city without an airport. However, there were plans before the war to build a new Charleston airport, as Wertz Field was already becoming commercially obsolete.

The city started construction of its new airport in 1944; the facility opened in 1947 as Kanawha Airport. The airport received its current name in 1985, honoring then-Brigadier General Chuck Yeager, a native of nearby Lincoln County who piloted the world's first supersonic flight in the Bell X-1.

The airport's construction was one of the most remarkable engineering accomplishments of the 1940s. The original topography of the area where Yeager Airport now stands consisted of three large and four small hilltops on a ridge overlooking the Elk River. In order to create enough flat land for an airport, it was necessary to shear off the tops of all seven hills, and use the soil to fill in the valleys in between. At that time, the construction of Kanawha Airport was reportedly the second-largest earth-moving project in history, behind the construction of the Panama Canal.

[edit] Airlines and destinations

[edit] Concourse A

Gates A1-A7


[edit] Concourse B

Gates B1-B2

[edit] Concourse C

Gates C1-C5

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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