Kassel Airport

Kassel Airport (formerly Kassel-Calden Airport,^[2] German Flughafen Kassel) (IATA: KSF, ICAO: EDVK) is a minor international airport serving the German city of Kassel in the state of Hesse. It is located 1.9 km (1.2 mi) west^[1] of Calden, 16.7 km (10.4 mi) northwest of Kassel and is mainly used for business and general aviation. There is also a flight school,^[3] an ultralight flying school, and a parachuting school based on site.

History

First airfield

Built on farmland, 908 ft (277 m) ASL lying NNE of the Hoher Dörnberg, the airport was opened on 11 July 1970. It has been operated as a public–private partnership since 1991.

New regional airport

A completely new regional airport has been built next to the old airport to accommodate commercial chartered and scheduled carriers as well as the business and general aviation from the old airport. The new airport has officially opened on 4 April 2013 with the arrival of a Germania flight from Frankfurt Airport.

The new airport faced several struggles when opened. The most important customer at first was the travel agency branch of REWE Group, with charter flights to the Mediterranean region. Originally, these were planned to be operated by XL Airways Germany. Following the bankruptcy of that airline, Enter Air was contracted instead, but also pulled out on 20 March 2013.^[4] The flights to Tenerife operated by Germania where scheduled to end in October 2013 but already terminated on 22 August 2013 due to low demand. Additionally, the flights to Antalya offered by Tailwind Airlines were reduced in frequency and served less than once a week.^[5]

Germania as the airports main user announced that their service to Palma de Mallorca would resume in the 2014 summer season. They also took over the flights to Antalya which had been offered by Tailwind Airlines during the 2013 summer season. While no airline or tour operator offered flights out of Kassel Airport during the 2013/14 winter season, Germania operated two flights per week to Palma de Mallorca and also two flights per week to Antalya in the following 2014 summer season. In the winter season 2014/2015 Germania operated flights to Antalya and Fuerteventura once a week.^[6] The airline also announced flights to Palma de Mallorca, Antalya, Heraklion and Hurghada for summer season 2015 and therefore increasing their presence at Kassel Airport.^[7]

On 15 March 2014 the airports' chief executive was fired with immediate effect.^[8] In January 2015, the airport was renamed Kassel Airport.^[2]

In December 2015, Germania announced it would reduce flights to and from Kassel due to low demand, the route to Hurghada ceased entirely by 30 December 2015.^[9]

Facilities

Main hall

Terminal

Kassel features one single small passenger terminal building with basic facilities such as car rental desks and some shops. As there are no jet bridges, buses and walk-boarding are in use.

Runway

The old airport used to have a single asphalt runway, 04/22 (040°/220°), which is 1,500 by 30 m (4,921 by 98 ft). There was a parallel grass strip north of the main runway, which is 700 by 30 m (2,297 by 98 ft).^[1] The new runway 09/27 has a length of 8,200 ft (2,500 m) and width of 147 ft (45 m).^[10]

The airport features two aprons, one in front of the passenger terminal for two mid-sized aircraft such as the Airbus A320 family and a separate one for general aviation aircraft.

Airlines and destinations

The following airline operates regular scheduled and charter flights at Kassel Airport:^[11]

Airlines	Destinations
Germania	Seasonal: Antalya, Fuerteventura, Heraklion, Palma de Mallorca, Tenerife-South (ends 4 February 2016)^[12]

The nearest other minor international airport is Paderborn Lippstadt Airport approx. 70 kilometres (43 mi) to the northwest.

Statistics

Apron overview


	Passengers
2013	49,557
2014	45,587
2015	64,926^[13]
Source: Kassel Airport^[14]

Ground transportation

Kassel Airport can be reached via the federal highway B7 which is itself connected to motorway A7. The express-bus route 100 connects the airport with Kassel city center (journey time approx. 25 minutes) as well as Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe station (40 minutes), which is an important long-distance railway hub.^[15] The nearest regional train station is Fürstenwald which is connected to the airport by bus as well.

References

External links

Airports in Germany

Major international	Berlin Brandenburg (under construction) Berlin-Schönefeld Berlin-Tegel Cologne/Bonn Düsseldorf Frankfurt Hamburg Hannover Munich Stuttgart

Minor international	Bremen Dortmund Dresden Erfurt/Weimar Friedrichshafen Hahn Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden Kassel Leipzig/Halle Lübeck Memmingen Münster/Osnabrück Nuremberg Paderborn/Lippstadt Rostock Saarbrücken Weeze

Domestic	Borkum Bremerhaven Emden Harle Heide–Büsum Heligoland Heringsdorf Juist Mannheim Norddeich Sylt Wangerooge

Unscheduled	Augsburg Bayreuth Bitburg Black Forest Braunschweig–Wolfsburg Frankfurt-Egelsbach Hamburg–Finkenwerder Hof–Plauen Ingolstadt/Manching Kiel Leipzig–Altenburg Magdeburg–Cochstedt Merzbrück Mönchengladbach Neubrandenburg Rechlin–Lärz Siegerland Stralsund–Barth Zweibrücken

Authority control	VIAF: 244294491 GND: 4645068-3

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