Tiruchirapalli Airport

Tiruchirapalli Airport () or Trichy Airport is an airport mostly serving Tiruchirapalli and adjacent districts in the state of Tamil Nadu, India. The airport, located on the NH 210 Tiruchirapalli - Rameswaram highway, is south of the city centre.

History

This airport was built by the British during World War II and primarily used by the British Airforce during the world wars. Damaged flights which landed in the airport were taken to a workshop in Ponmalai, at a distance of 2 km, repaired and brought back to service. The airport was given permission for civilian operations after the war. Actual passenger traffic started only in the early '80s. Air Lanka started its operations in 1981 with a weekly flight to Colombo and subsequently increased its operations to 11 flights a week. Indian Airlines started its operations to Chennai and mid-east countries in mid '80s.

According to P. R. Brouse (Air Traffic controller at Trichy airport in 1942), the airport was used as race course during 1930-40's. The airport had no building except an ATC and a runway 600 metres long. According to him, Trichy airport handled TATA's Dakota flight. The aircraft from Mumbai (via Bangalore) after refuelling at Trichy airport carried passengers to Colombo. Usually 5 to 20 people traveled on this flight from Trichy.

Air Ceylon (Srilankan Airlines) began operations in the late '40s while Indian started services before 1980. Both airlines operated...
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