Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport is an airport that serves the nation of

Belize Belize (; bzj, Bileez) is a Caribbean and Central American country on the northeastern coast of Central America. It is bordered by Mexico to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and Guatemala to the west and south. It also shares a wate ...

's largest city,

Belize City Belize City is the largest city in Belize and was once the capital of the former British Honduras. According to the 2010 census, Belize City has a population of 57,169 people in 16,162 households. It is at the mouth of the Haulover Creek, wh ...

along the eastern coast of

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

. It was named after politician Philip S. W. Goldson, who died in 2001. The airport is about 30 minutes drive from Belize City's centre, in

Ladyville Ladyville is the largest village in the country of Belize, eight miles northwest of Belize City in the Belize District. The Philip Goldson Highway connects Ladyville to Belize City. History Although originally a separate settlement, Ladyville ha ...

. The airport is at an elevation of , which means both the airport and the entirety of Belize City are at risk of serious

flooding A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrolog ...

due to its low elevation and coastal location. For this reason, Belize's capital has been moved to

Belmopan Belmopan () is the capital city of Belize. Its population in 2010 was 16,451. In addition to being the smallest capital city in the continental Americas by population, Belmopan is the third-largest settlement in Belize, behind Belize City and S ...

, but the airport remains the largest and busiest in the country. With stable passenger growth, Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport is currently the fifth busiest airport in Central America.

History

Originally known as Belize International Airport, the airport was renamed in honor of Philip S. W. Goldson on 7 February 1988.

Military use

Due to the Belizean–Guatemalan territorial dispute, Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport has hosted several military units over the years since its construction. In 1984, a senior

US Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

General stated that it was "the best defended airfield in Central America". Most notable residents have been Headquarters British Forces Belize,

No. 1417 (Tactical Ground Attack) Flight RAF The numero sign or numero symbol, №, (also represented as Nº, No, No. or no.), is a typographic abbreviation of the word ''number''(''s'') indicating ordinal numeration, especially in names and titles. For example, using the numero sign, t ...

operating

Harrier jump jet The Harrier, informally referred to as the Harrier jump jet, is a family of jet-powered attack aircraft capable of vertical/short takeoff and landing operations (V/STOL). Named after a bird of prey, it was originally developed by British ma ...

No. 1563 (Helicopter support) Flight RAF No. 1563 Flight RAF (1563 Flt) is an independent flight of the British Royal Air Force (RAF). It operates the Westland Puma HC2 helicopters in Brunei. It previously flew tactical support missions for locally garrisoned British Army units, as we ...

, resident Anti-Aircraft Squadrons of the

RAF Regiment The Royal Air Force Regiment (RAF Regiment) is part of the Royal Air Force and functions as a specialist corps. Founded by royal warrant in 1942, the Corps carries out soldiering tasks relating to the delivery of air power. Examples of such ta ...

, resident helicopter units of the

Army Air Corps Army Air Corps may refer to the following army aviation corps: * Army Air Corps (United Kingdom), the army aviation element of the British Army * Philippine Army Air Corps (1935–1941) * United States Army Air Corps (1926–1942), or its p ...

HarDet Belize No. 1417 Flight RAF (1417 Flt) was an independent Flight (military unit), flight of the Royal Air Force which existed between 1941 and 1993 at various times in a variety of roles. This Flight had probably the most interesting incarnations of all ...

, Butcher Radar and Belize Defence Forces, among others.

Price Barracks Price Barracks is a military installation located just north of Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport which is located in Ladyville some 8 miles to the north west of Belize City. It is the main base of the Belize Defence Force. History The b ...

is a military installation located just north of the airport, which was formerly known as Airport Camp, the headquarters of British Forces Belize.

Historical airline service

In 1950,

TACA Airlines Transportes Aereos del Continente Americano, (''Air Transports of the American Continent'', known and branded formerly as TACA International), operating as Avianca El Salvador, is an airline owned by Kingsland Holdings based in El Salvador. As ...

(which is now

Avianca Honduras Isleña de Inversiones S.A. de C.V. branded Avianca Honduras was an regional airline based in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. It offered mostly scheduled and chartered passenger flights out of its hub at Ramón Villeda Morales International Airport. ...

) was operating weekly nonstop flights to

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

and

San Salvador San Salvador (; ) is the capital and the largest city of El Salvador and its eponymous department. It is the country's political, cultural, educational and financial center. The Metropolitan Area of San Salvador, which comprises the capital i ...

as well as weekly direct one stop service to

Managua ) , settlement_type = Capital city , motto = , image_map = , mapsize = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Nicara ...

with

Douglas DC-4 The Douglas DC-4 is an American four-engined (piston), propeller-driven airliner developed by the Douglas Aircraft Company. Military versions of the plane, the C-54 and R5D, served during World War II, in the Berlin Airlift and into the 1960s ...

propliners. TACA subsequently began operating

Vickers Viscount The Vickers Viscount is a British medium-range turboprop airliner first flown in 1948 by Vickers-Armstrongs. A design requirement from the Brabazon Committee, it entered service in 1953 and was the first turboprop-powered airliner. The Visc ...

turboprops on a weekly southbound service flying a routing of New Orleans - Belize City -

Guatemala City Guatemala City ( es, Ciudad de Guatemala), known locally as Guatemala or Guate, is the capital and largest city of Guatemala, and the most populous urban area in Central America. The city is located in the south-central part of the country, nest ...

- San Salvador -

Tegucigalpa Tegucigalpa (, , ), formally Tegucigalpa, Municipality of the Central District ( es, Tegucigalpa, Municipio del Distrito Central or ''Tegucigalpa, M.D.C.''), and colloquially referred to as ''Tegus'' or ''Teguz'', is the capital and largest city ...

- Managua - San Jose, Costa Rica -

Panama City, Panama Panama City ( es, Ciudad de Panamá, links=no; ), also known as Panama (or Panamá in Spanish), is the capital and largest city of Panama. It has an urban population of 880,691, with over 1.5 million in its metropolitan area. The city is locat ...

. In 1953,

British West Indian Airways BWIA West Indies Airways Limited, known locally as "Bee-Wee" and also as British West Indian Airways and BWIA International, was the national airline based in Trinidad and Tobago. At the end of operations, BWIA was the largest airline operating o ...

(BWIA, which is now Caribbean Airlines) in association with British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC, which is now

British Airways British Airways (BA) is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a populati ...

) was operating one flight a week to Belize from

Kingston, Jamaica Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley Inter ...

via an intermediate stop in

Grand Cayman Grand Cayman is the largest of the three Cayman Islands and the location of the territory's capital, George Town. In relation to the other two Cayman Islands, it is approximately 75 miles (121 km) southwest of Little Cayman and 90 miles ( ...

with a

Vickers VC.1 Viking The Vickers VC.1 Viking is a British twin-engine short-range airliner derived from the Vickers Wellington bomber and built by Vickers-Armstrongs Limited at Brooklands near Weybridge in Surrey. After the Second World War, the Viking was an i ...

twin-prop aircraft with this flight offering connecting service via Kingston from a BOAC flight that operated a routing from

London, England London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major s ...

via stops in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

Nassau, Bahamas Nassau ( ) is the capital and largest city of the Bahamas. With a population of 274,400 as of 2016, or just over 70% of the entire population of the Bahamas, Nassau is commonly defined as a primate city, dwarfing all other towns in the country. ...

and

Montego Bay, Jamaica Montego Bay is the capital of the parish of St. James in Jamaica. The city is the fourth-largest urban area in the country by population, after Kingston, Spanish Town, and Portmore, all of which form the Greater Kingston Metropolitan Area, h ...

. BWIA in conjunction with BOAC would later operate weekly nonstop service between the airport and Kingston with

turboprop aircraft. Thirty years later in 1983, four airlines were operating jet service into the airport according to the

Official Airline Guide OAG is a global travel data provider with headquarters in the UK. The company was founded in 1929 and operates in the USA, Singapore, Japan, Lithuania and China. It has a large network of flight information data including schedules, flight sta ...

( OAG) including Air Florida with nonstop Boeing 737-200 flights from

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

and

San Pedro Sula San Pedro Sula () is the capital of Cortés Department, Honduras. It is located in the northwest corner of the country in the Sula Valley, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) south of Puerto Cortés on the Caribbean Sea. With a population of 671,460 ...

, Servicio Aereo de Honduras (

SAHSA ''Servicio Aéreo de Honduras S.A.'' otherwise known as SAHSA Airlines was the national flag carrier airline of Honduras from October 22, 1945, to January 14, 1994. The airline was a subsidiary of Pan American Airways and merged with ''Transpor ...

) with nonstop

Boeing 727-100 The Boeing 727 is an American Narrow-body aircraft, narrow-body airliner that was developed and produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. After the heavy Boeing 707, 707 quad-jet was introduced in 1958, Boeing addressed the demand for shorter f ...

flights from

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...

(via

Houston Intercontinental Airport George Bush Intercontinental Airport is an international airport in Houston, Texas, United States, serving the Greater Houston metropolitan area. Located about north of Downtown Houston between Interstate 45 and Interstate 69/U.S. Highway 59 ...

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

and San Pedro Sula,

International with nonstop Boeing 737-200 and

British Aircraft Corporation The British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) was a British aircraft manufacturer formed from the government-pressured merger of English Electric Aviation Ltd., Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft), the Bristol Aeroplane Company and Hunting Aircraft in 1 ...

BAC One-Eleven The BAC One-Eleven (or BAC-111/BAC 1-11) was an early jet airliner produced by the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC). Originally conceived by Hunting Aircraft as a 30-seat jet, before its merger into BAC in 1960, it was launched as an 80-se ...

flights from Houston (via Houston Intercontinental Airport), Miami, New Orleans and

, and Transportes Aereos Nacionales ( TAN Airlines) with nonstop Boeing 737-200 flights from Miami and San Pedro Sula while local air carrier Maya Airways was operating domestic service in Belize with

Britten-Norman Islander The Britten-Norman BN-2 Islander is a British light utility aircraft and regional airliner designed and originally manufactured by Britten-Norman of the United Kingdom. Still in production, the Islander is one of the best-selling commercial air ...

twin-prop aircraft. Also according to the OAG, by 1989 TACA had introduced wide body Boeing 767-200 nonstop service to Miami in addition to its Boeing 737-200 flights with other service to Miami at this time being operated by

Eastern Airlines Eastern Air Lines, also colloquially known as Eastern, was a major United States airline from 1926 to 1991. Before its dissolution, it was headquartered at Miami International Airport in an unincorporated area of Miami-Dade County, Florida. Ea ...

with Boeing 727-200s as well as TAN with Boeing 737-200s.

Belize Airways Belize Airways Limited was Belize's first and only national airline. The carrier began flights from Belize International Airport (now Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport) on October 1, 1977. In 1980, the airline declared bankruptcy. Its fin ...

Ltd. was a scheduled passenger airline based at the airport which operated flights to

and

La Ceiba La Ceiba () is a municipality, the capital of the Honduran department of Atlántida (department), Atlántida and a port city on the northern coast of Honduras in Central America. It is located on the southern edge of the Caribbean, forming part ...

with

Boeing 720 The Boeing 720 is an American narrow-body airliner produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Announced in July 1957 as a 707 derivative for shorter flights from shorter runways, the 720 first flew on November 23, 1959. Its type certificate was ...

and stretched

series 500 jetliners operated at various times during its existence from 1977 to 1980 according to its timetables.http://www.timetableimages.com/i-s/st80ca.jpg

Airlines and destinations

Passenger

Cargo

Statistics

Future plans

Philip S. W. Goldson International Airport will have integrated access with proposed Belize City Central Railway Station.

References

External links

*
Official website
{{authority control Airports in Belize Belize District Belize Rural Central