Asmara International Airport
| Asmara International Airport | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 An Eritrean Airlines Boeing 767 at the Asmara International Airport. | |||||||||||||||
  ASM | |||||||||||||||
| Summary | |||||||||||||||
| Airport type | Military/Public | ||||||||||||||
| Serves | Asmara | ||||||||||||||
| Location | Asmara, Eritrea | ||||||||||||||
| Hub for | Nasair Eritrea | ||||||||||||||
| Elevation AMSL | 7,661 ft / 2,335 m | ||||||||||||||
| Coordinates | 15°17′30.67″N 38°54′38.40″E / 15.2918528°N 38.9106667°E | ||||||||||||||
| Runways | |||||||||||||||
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Asmara International Airport, formerly known as Yohannes IV International Airport (IATA: ASM, ICAO: HHAS), is an airport in Asmara, the capital of Eritrea.
History
The Asmara airport was created in 1922, the first such facility to be opened in Italian Eritrea. It served as the main military airport in the territory. In the mid-1930s, the airport began offering civilian and commercial flights.
On 7 July 1935, an agreement was signed with Imperial Airways to connect Asmara to Khartoum. A regular Kassala-Khartoum-Asmara-Massawa 770 km commercial route was subsequently started with a Caproni 133 of the Italian Ala Littoria.[1]
During World War II, the airport was nearly destroyed by the British. It was later renovated in the 1950s, and reopened to offer flights to Addis Ababa and other cities in Ethiopia. With Eritrea's independence in the 1990s, the airport became an international portal to the new nation. In April 2003, after improvements to the airport's runways, Eritrean Airlines started regular services between Asmara and Frankfurt, Milan, Nairobi and Rome.
Facilities
The Asmara International Airport is the largest airport in Eritrea.
In 2004, it served 136,526 passengers (+11.8% vs. 2003).
The airport has capacity restrictions due to its small terminal, short runway and 1.5-mile altitude. Consequently, large jet aircraft (like an A380, MD-11 or 747) cannot fly to the airport. Aircraft of this size would instead need to use the Massawa International Airport on the Eritrean coast.
Airlines and destinations
| Airlines | Destinations |
|---|---|
| EgyptAir | Cairo |
| Eritrean Airlines | Jeddah |
| Nova Airways | Kassala, Khartoum |
| Qatar Airways | Doha[2] |
| Sudan Airways | Khartoum |
| Turkish Airlines | Istanbul-Atatürk [3] |
| Yemenia | Sana'a |
Notes
- ↑ Flavio Riccitelli (A.I.D.A.). "ALA LITTORIA S.A. (1934–1941)". Il Postalista. Retrieved 7 October 2013.
- ↑ "QATAR Airways Adds Asmara Service from Dec 2014". Airline Route. 15 August 2014. Retrieved 15 August 2014.
- ↑ "Turkish Airlines Adds Asmara Service from late-August 2014". Airline Route. 5 May 2014. Retrieved 5 May 2014.
References
This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the Air Force Historical Research Agency.
External links
- Airport information for HHAS at World Aero Data. Data current as of October 2006.
