The airport is part of the Port of Huntsville (along with the International Intermodal Center and Jetplex Industrial Park), and serves the Huntsville-Decatur Combined Statistical Area. Opened in October 1967 as the Huntsville Jetport, it was the third airport for Huntsville.[4][5] The airport has 12 gates with restrooms, shops, restaurants, phones and murals depicting aviation and space exploration scenes. The airport also has on a 3-star hotel on the premises.[6] The Four Points by Sheraton is located above the ticketing area and lobby, (adjacent to the terminal is a parking garage and to opposite sides are the control tower and a golf course).
The airport's west runway, at 12,600 ft (3,800 m), is the second longest commercial runway in the southeastern United States, being 400 ft (120 m) shorter than the longest runway at Miami International Airport. Huntsville is frequently used as a diversion airport from larger hubs in the Southeast, such as Atlanta, due to its long runways and sophisticated snow removal and de-icing equipment.[7]
The airport's "Fly Huntsville" marketing campaign encourages passengers to depart from Huntsville instead of driving to Birmingham or Nashville.[8] An August 2009 report by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics for the first quarter of 2009 revealed that Huntsville passengers paid, on average, was the highest airfares in the United States.[9] However, the airport reported that commercial airline passenger traffic increased 2.3% in January 2010 over the previous year.[10]
The original airport, Huntsville Flying Field/Mayfair Airport, was south of the city. It had sod runways, no lighting and opened in the early 1930s. By 1934 the airport had four dirt/sod runways, southwest of today's intersection of Whitesburg Drive and Bob Wallace Avenue.[14]
A second airport south of downtown opened in 1941 with two paved runways, Runway 18/36 being 4,000' long. The terminal building was a wooden shack at the northeast end of Runway 5/23; the National Weather Service opened at the municipal airport in 1958. The second airport was near today's intersection of Memorial Parkway and Airport Road; traces of runways and terminal facilities can be seen from the air.[15]
Huntsville's first scheduled jets were United 727s in late 1966. Carl T. Jones Field opened in 1967, west of the city along Highway 20 and County Line Road. A ribbon cutting ceremony was held 15 September 1968 with Dr. Wernher von Braun and Senator John Sparkman in attendance.
On July 10, 2018, the airport announced that Frontier Airlines would begin nonstop service to Denver and Orlando in October with the A320 Family. This marked the resumption of low-cost airline presence at the airport.
Airport facilities
The airport covers 6,000 acres (2,428 ha) at an elevation of 629 feet (192 m). It has two asphalt runways: 18R/36L is 12,600 by 150 feet (3,840 x 46 m) and 18L/36R is 10,001 by 150 feet (3,048 x 46 m).[16] In the year ending December 31, 2019, the airport had 70,816 aircraft operations which averaged about 194 flights per day.
In 1969-80, Huntsville had nonstop or direct flights to Los Angeles, Florida and Texas during the U.S. space program. These flights served the NASAMarshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.
In June 1967, Eastern Airlines introduced "The Space Corridor" linking Huntsville with St. Louis, Seattle and the NASAKennedy Space Center in Florida.[21] In the June 13, 1967, timetable, Eastern Boeing 727-100s flew to St. Louis and on to Seattle, and nonstop to Orlando continuing to Melbourne, Florida, near the Kennedy Space Center. Eastern flew direct Douglas DC-9-30s to Houston, home of the NASAJohnson Space Center, via New Orleans in the late 1960s. Eastern had direct jets to Chicago during the early 1970s via Nashville. In April 1975, Eastern served Nashville, Orlando and St. Louis nonstop from Huntsville on 727s and DC-9s.[22]
In November 1967, Eastern scheduled nine departures each weekday from the new airport while United had four and Southern had 17.
By 1989, the airport was linked to major airline hubs: Delta served Atlanta and Dallas/Fort Worth, Eastern served Atlanta, American served Dallas/Fort Worth and Nashville, Northwest served Memphis, and United served Chicago and Washington Dulles. United and American flew nonstop to Birmingham, United continued to fly nonstop to Knoxville, and Delta had a daily flight to Memphis.[24] United pulled out entirely by 1995, while USAir entered the market in the early 1990s with daily flights to Charlotte.[25]
In 1989, Huntsville International became the first airport in the United States to install an ASR-9 dual-channel airport surveillance radar system.[26] and became one of five airports in the United States to use glass walled jet bridges.In 2015, thyssenkrupp Airport Systems manufactured and installed new glass jet brides making Huntsville International Airport the first in the Southeast to enhance their facility by using all glass jet bridges.[27]
Currently, Huntsville International is undergoing major renovations on their runways and concourse facilities to meet the expected future demand and flow of passengers and goods.[28][29]
Accidents and incidents
On April 4, 1977, a Douglas DC-9-31 operating as Southern Airways Flight 242 took off from Huntsville after a stopover from Muscle Shoals, and encountered severe storms shortly after. Hail later struck the plane causing the plane engines to fail, and shortly thereafter the airplane crashed near New Hope, Georgia. 63 were killed aboard the plane and also nine people on the ground; 20 passengers and two crew members survived.
On June 18, 2014, an IAI Westwind corporate aircraft crashed upon takeoff, killing all three on board.[30][31]
This list is incomplete. Marshall Space Flight Center is in an unincorporated area near Huntsville. The vast majority of the city is in the Huntsville School District with small portions in the other three.
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