Pokhara Airport (IATA: VNPK) is a domestic airport serving Pokhara in Nepal. Pokhara Airport will be gradually replaced by Nepal's third international airport, Pokhara International Airport, in 2023.[4] While most operations were transferred to the new airport on 1 January 2023, the STOL-operations to Jomsom are still operated from this airport.[5]
In the late 2010s, Pokhara Airport became Nepal's second domestic hub for air travel.[8]
Facilities
The apron of the airport is relatively small and can only handle eight propeller planes at a time. Pokhara Airport is a diversion airport for the country's main airport in Kathmandu in times of problems such as fog. Due to a short runway and crowded apron, flights must often be re-diverted to third airports with even shorter runways.[9]
Several Ultralight aviation companies offer recreational and sightseeing flights from Pokhara Airport.[12]
Statistics
Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.
Annual passenger traffic at PKR airport.
See Wikidata query.
Incidents and accidents
On 6 November 1997, a Necon AirAvro 748-100 had a hydraulic failure after landing from a flight from Kathmandu Airport. The pilot attempted to steer the plane, but it hit another stationary Hawker Siddeley HS 748. There were no fatalities among the four crew members and 44 passengers.[13]
On 22 August 2002, a Shangri-La Air Twin Otter aircraft, on a flight from Jomsom to Pokhara, crashed into a hill that was under complete cloud cover following three days of continuous rain. All three crew and 15 passengers were killed.[14]
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