- Prince Mohammad Bin Abdulaziz Airport
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Prince Mohammad Bin Abdulaziz International Airport IATA: MED – ICAO: OEMA Location of airport in Saudi Arabia
MEDSummary Airport type Public Operator General Authority of Civil Aviation Location Medina Elevation AMSL 2,151 ft / 656 m Coordinates 24°33′12″N 039°42′18″E / 24.55333°N 39.705°ECoordinates: 24°33′12″N 039°42′18″E / 24.55333°N 39.705°E Runways Direction Length Surface ft m 17/35 10,800 3,290 Asphalt 18/36 9,980 3,040 Asphalt Statistics (2004) Passengers 1,592,000 Prince Mohammad Bin Abdulaziz International Airport or Prince Mohammad Airport (alternatively "Mohammed") (IATA: MED, ICAO: OEMA) is a regional airport in the western Saudi city of Medina. Opened in 1974, it handles mostly domestic flights, although it has limited scheduled international services to regional destinations such as Cairo, Doha, Dubai, Istanbul and Kuwait. and It also handles charter international flights during the Hajj season.
It is the fourth busiest airport in Saudi Arabia, handling 1,592,000 passengers in 2004, including 378,715 Hajj charter passengers. It handles on average 20-25 flights a day, although this number triples during the Hajj season and school holidays.
As with other regional airports in Saudi Arabia, it is modestly equipped, with a simple single-storey terminal and a small parking apron. It has two runways: a main runway and an angled runway for cross-wind operations. There are plans to upgrade the airport to full international specification to handle the expected increase in passenger traffic to 3 million passengers a year.
View of chartered airliners in temporary Saudi colours, on Apron on a busy day of the 2008 Hajj Season. Also seen, a scheduled Saudi E-170 and Iran Air A300 in the foreground and background respectively.
View of Apron and International Arrivals Terminal on an early Friday morning during the Hajj Season, November 2008. In sight is a scheduled Turkish Airlines bound for Istanbul, with Haj Chartered Uzbekistan Airways, Sudan Airways, Egypt Air and Saudi Airlines in the back ground. Photo was taken from a Saudi Airlines MD-90 bound for Riyadh.Contents
Airlines and destinations
Airlines Destinations Air Arabia Sharjah EgyptAir Alexandria-El Nohza, Cairo Emirates Dubai Felix Airways Sana'a [1] Gulf Air Bahrain Lion Air Jakarta Kuwait Airways Kuwait Middle East Airlines Seasonal: Beirut Nas Air Riyadh, Kuwait, Sharjah Pakistan International Airlines Karachi, Multan [2] Qatar Airways Doha Royal Falcon Amman-Marka Royal Jordanian Amman-Queen Alia Saudi Arabian Airlines Abha, Amman-Queen Alia, Arar, Cairo, Damascus, Dammam, Dhaka, Gassim, Gurayat, Hail, Islamabad, Istanbul-Atatürk, Jakarta-Soekarno-Hatta, Jazan, Jeddah, Jouf, Karachi, Kuala Lumpur, Lahore, Peshawar, Qaisumah, Riyadh, Sharjah, Tabuk, Taif, Wedjh Turkish Airlines Istanbul-Atatürk Incidents
On 16 March 2001, the airport was the scene of a bloody end to the hijacking of a Russian based Vnukovo Airlines Tupolev 154 Jet bound from Istanbul to Moscow carrying 162 passengers. The hijackers apparently Chechen Separatists, had landed at the airport and had demanded additional amount of fuel to fly to Afghanistan. After 18 hours of no negotiations, Saudi Security forces stormed the plane bringing an end to the hijack. There were three fatalities including a hijacker, a Turkish passenger and a Russian Air stewardess.[3]
See also
- List of airports in Saudi Arabia
- Transportation in Saudi Arabia
References
- ^ "Felix Airways Launches on Thursday 03.09.2009 its new route to Saudi Arabia". Felix Airways. http://www.felixairways.com/madinah.php. Retrieved 2009-09-11.
- ^ PK to MED
- ^ "Bloody end to Chechen HIjack". BBC News. 2001-03-16. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1223972.stm. Retrieved 2009-01-29.
External links
- General Authority of Civil Aviation
- Airport information for OEMA at World Aero Data. Data current as of October 2006.
Categories:- Airports in Saudi Arabia
- Medina
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