Calicut International Airport , also known as Kozhikode Airport or Karipur Airport, is an international airport located in

Karipur Karipur (also spelt Karippur) is a locality in the Kondotty taluk of the Malappuram district of Kerala, India, 25 km (16 mi) from the city of Malappuram. It is best known as the site of Karipur International Airport, serving travellers ...

, Malappuram district of

Kerala Kerala ( ; ) is a state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile regions of Cochin, Malabar, South ...

, India. It serves the

Malabar region The Malabar Coast is the southwestern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Geographically, it comprises the wettest regions of southern India, as the Western Ghats intercept the moisture-laden monsoon rains, especially on their westward-facing m ...

Kozhikode Kozhikode (), also known in English as Calicut, is a city along the Malabar Coast in the state of Kerala in India. It has a corporation limit population of 609,224 and a metropolitan population of more than 2 million, making it the second l ...

Malappuram Malappuram (also Malapuram) () is a city in the Indian state of Kerala, spread over an area of including the surrounding suburban areas. The first municipality in the district formed in 1970, Malappuram serves as the administrative headquarter ...

Wayanad Wayanad () is a district in the north-east of Indian state Kerala with administrative headquarters at the municipality of Kalpetta. It is the only plateau in Kerala. The Wayanad Plateau forms a continuation of the Mysore Plateau, the southern ...

and

Palakkad Palakkad (), formerly known as Palghat, historically known as Palakkattussery is a city and municipality in the Indian state of Kerala. It is the administrative headquarters of the Palakkad District. Palakkad is most densely populated municipal ...

. It is situated 28 kilometers away from

city and 25 kilometers away from

city. It serves two of the seven metropolitan areas in the state - Kozhikode metropolitan area and

Malappuram metropolitan area The Malappuram Metropolitan Area or Malappuram Urban Agglomeration is an urban agglomeration centred around the city of Malappuram, Manjeri in Malappuram district, Kerala, India. It is the 25th largest urban agglomeration in India and the 4t ...

. The airport opened on 13 April 1988. The airport serves as an operating base for

Air India Express Air India Express is an Indian low-cost airline headquartered in Kochi, Kerala. It is operated by Air India Express Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of Indian flag carrier airline Air India. It operates around 649 flights per week to 33 de ...

and operates Hajj Pilgrimage services to

Medina Medina,, ', "the radiant city"; or , ', (), "the city" officially Al Madinah Al Munawwarah (, , Turkish: Medine-i Münevvere) and also commonly simplified as Madīnah or Madinah (, ), is the second-holiest city in Islam, and the capital of the ...

and Jeddah from

. It is the twenty first–busiest airport in India in terms of overall passenger traffic and also the sixth-busiest airport in India after

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders ...

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' fin ...

Kochi Kochi (), also known as Cochin ( ) ( the official name until 1996) is a major port city on the Malabar Coast of India bordering the Laccadive Sea, which is a part of the Arabian Sea. It is part of the district of Ernakulam in the state of K ...

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

and

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River, in the northern part of Southern India ...

in terms of international traffic. It received international airport status on 2 February 2006. It is one of a few airports in the country with a

tabletop runway A tabletop runway is a runway that is located on the top of a plateau or hill with one or both ends adjacent to a steep precipice which drops into a deep gorge. This type of runway creates an optical illusion of being at the same level as the ...

History

Early years

The airport was inaugurated in April 1988. In 1977, Calicut Airport was sanctioned due to long periods of struggle under the leadership of the late freedom fighter K. P. Kesava Menon. In the 1990s, Gulf Malayalis played an important role in the development of the airport - they collected funds for the purpose when the Union Government claimed it did not have any. This led to the inception of the Malabar International Airport Development Society, which helped raise funds for the airport's development. Consequently, major developments of facilities, such as an extension of the runway from 6,000 feet to 9,000 feet to facilitate the operation of large aircraft, were carried out with loans from the HUDCO. It received the status of an international airport on 2 February 2006, which led to more development in its infrastructure, for handling the operation of international flights from its terminal. It is the 12th-busiest airport in India in terms of its passenger traffic and 11th-busiest in cargo handling.

Wide-body aircraft restrictions

Since 1 May 2015, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) imposed restrictions on the operation of wide-body aircraft such as

Boeing 777 The Boeing 777, commonly referred to as the Triple Seven, is an American long-range wide-body airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the world's largest twinjet. The 777 was designed to bridge the gap betw ...

and 747 for a period of six months for runway recarpeting, which had been long overdue at this airport. As a result, Emirates, Saudia and two

Air India Air India is the flag carrier airline of India, headquartered at New Delhi. It is owned by Talace Private Limited, a Special-Purpose Vehicle (SPV) of Tata Sons, after Air India Limited's former owner, the Government of India, completed the ...

Boeing 747 flight operations had to move temporarily to

Cochin International Airport Cochin International Airport is an International airport serving the city of Kochi, in the state of Kerala, India. Located at Nedumbassery, about northeast of the city centre, Cochin International Airport is first of its kind which is develo ...

during this time. The airport authorities had expressed doubt about getting permission to operate wide-bodied aircraft from the airport, even after the completion of the recarpeting, for the runway in the airport is not large enough for the operation of jumbo aircraft. AAI had earlier instructed that all airports using widebody aircraft must have 240 m of RESA in each direction, whereas that of Calicut Airport must have 90 m. The airport director K Janardhanan said the short runway was a major hurdle in operating wide-bodied aircraft from the

and the runway length should be extended from the current 2,850 m to 3,150 m to operate wide-bodied aircraft, he added. The major hurdle in extending the runway is the delay in acquiring the land which requires a total of of land for extending the runway and associated facilities. The state government has been finding the task difficult, for it requires relocation of 1,500 families living around the airport. As of 10 June 2016, not much action has been taken for land acquisition to help increase the runway length. The AAI decided to get a safety area ( RESA) to avoid the aircraft overrunning the end of the table-top runway. On 7 August 2020, wide-body aircraft have been banned from flying to CCJ after the crash of IX 1344, which overran the table-top runway. As of November 2020, the airport does not have the recommended

Runway safety area A runway safety area (RSA) or runway end safety area (RESA) is defined as "the surface surrounding the runway prepared or suitable for reducing the risk of damage to airplanes in the event of an undershoot, overshoot, or excursion from the runway. ...

Engineered Materials Arresting System An engineered materials arrestor system, engineered materials arresting system (EMAS), or arrester bed is a bed of engineered materials built at the end of a runway to reduce the severity of the consequences of a runway excursion. Engineered ma ...

installed. The land acquisition procedures for runway development are progressing as of July 2022.

Reinstatement of wide-body aircraft operations

As advocated by various Malayali associations like KMCC, MCC and MDF and others,

Gulf Malayali The Kerala Gulf diaspora refers to the people of Kerala living in the West Asian Arab states of the Persian Gulf. In 2008, they numbered more than 2.5 million. Nearly 80 percent of Indians living in Kuwait are from Kerala according to the 2008 sur ...

s, political parties, Kerala State Government and MPs from

, on 9 August 2018, DGCA gave approval for resuming wide-body aircraft (Code E category) operations from Calicut International Airport. In the beginning, Saudia has been given permission to start nonstop flights to Jeddah and

Riyadh Riyadh (, ar, الرياض, 'ar-Riyāḍ, lit.: 'The Gardens' Najdi pronunciation: ), formerly known as Hajr al-Yamamah, is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of th ...

, Boeing 777-200LR and

Airbus A330-300 The Airbus A330 is a wide-body aircraft developed and produced by Airbus. Airbus conceived several derivatives of the A300, its first airliner in the mid-1970s. Then the company began development on the A330 twinjet in parallel with the A34 ...

. After three and a half years, the wide-body aircraft ( Airbus 330-300) of Saudi Arabian Airlines from Jeddah landed at Calicut International Airport at 11:04 (IST) on 5 December 2018. It flew back to Jeddah on the same day at 13:19 (IST). Saudia has also resumed its services to

from Calicut in December 2018. On 5 July 2019, Saudi Arabian Airlines flew with the Boeing 777-300ER and

to CCJ. DGCA gave approval for wide-body aircraft operations of

from Calicut International Airport using Boeing 747-400, Boeing 777-200LR, Boeing 777-300ER, and

Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner The Boeing 787 Dreamliner is an American wide-body jet airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. After dropping its unconventional Sonic Cruiser project, Boeing announced the conventional 7E7 on January 29, 2003, ...

. Emirates also secured approval from DGCA to operate Boeing 777-200LR and 777-300ER from Calicut. Air India already resumed its service with Boeing 747-400 Jumbo aircraft and with Boeing 777-300 ER aircraft. On 7 August 2020, an Air India Express flight overran the runway causing 21 people to perish. As a result, no wide-body aircraft has permission to fly to Calicut Airport, and as of 7 July 2022, runway renovation is in progress.

Statistics

Airlines and destinations

Passenger

Cargo

The following cargo airlines fly to the airport: * SpiceXpress

Connectivity

; Road Calicut International Airport is located between two National Highways. The closest one is

National Highway 966 National Highway 966 (NH 966) is a highway which connects Palakkad, Malappuram and Kozhikode district headquarters in Kerala. It was previously known as NH 213. It covers a distance of 125 km. At Ramanattukara, near Kozhikode, it joins N ...

(NH-966) situated at a distance of 2.3 kilometers and the other one being

National Highway 66 The following highways are numbered 66: Australia * Barkly Highway (Northern Territory) * Riddoch Highway Canada * Alberta Highway 66 * Highway 66 (Ontario) Finland * Kantatie 66 (Orivesi — Lapua) France * A66 autoroute Germany * Bunde ...

(NH-66) which is around 8 kilometers from the airport. NH-966 joins NH-66 at

Ramanattukara Ramanattukara is a municipality census town in Kozhikode district in the Indian state of Kerala. This town was formerly called Kadungan Chira village. Ramanattukara is located 14 km away from Kozhikode city. Developing as a suburb of K ...

, located 12 kilometers from the airport. This combined road network enables seamless connectivity to the north to

Kannur Kannur (), formerly known in English as Cannanore, is a city and a municipal corporation in the state of Kerala, India. It is the administrative headquarters of the Kannur district and situated north of the major port city and commercial hu ...

, and

, and towards the south to

Thrissur Thrissur (), formerly Trichur, also known by its historical name Thrissivaperur, is a city and the headquarters of the Thrissur district in Kerala, India. It is the third largest urban agglomeration in Kerala after Kochi and Kozhikode, and t ...

, and Coimbatore. ;Buses

Kerala State Road Transport Corporation Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) is a state-owned road transport corporation in the Indian state of Kerala. It is one of the country's oldest state-run public bus transport services. The corporation is divided into three zones ( ...

operates ''FlyBus'' (low-floor AC bus) services to the city of

from the airport. This is one of the cheapest available options to travel to the city. There are only a handful of these services so travelers looking for cheap options to travel can take an Auto-rickshaw to Airport Junction (2.8 km away) where buses are available to Kozhikode, Malappuram, Palakkad etc. AirIndia Express Landing Calicut

;Rail The closest railway stations are Feroke railway station (around 18 kilometers from the airport),

Parappanangadi railway station Parappanangadi Railway Station is at the heart of the Parappanangadi town in Kerala, India, located 26 km away from Malappuram. It is one of the oldest railway stations in Kerala. This railway station was a part of the first rail route (Ti ...

(around 20 kilometers from the airport),

Tanur railway station Tanur railway station (code: TANR) is a railway station in Malappuram district, Kerala and falls under the Palakkad railway division of the Southern Railway zone, Indian Railways Indian Railways (IR) is a statutory body under the own ...

(around 28 kilometers from the airport),

Kozhikode railway station Kozhikode railway station also known as Calicut railway station is one of the largest railway stations in the state of Kerala, India. At in financial year 2018–19, it is the largest in terms of passenger revenue in Palakkad division. The sta ...

(around 28 kilometers from the airport),

Tirur railway station Tirur railway station ''(Code:TIR)'' is the oldest railway station in Kerala. It is a major railway station serving the town of Tirur in Malappuram district of Kerala. It lies in the Shoranur–Mangalore section of the Southern Railways. Almos ...

(around 34 kilometers away), and Angadipuram railway station (around 37 kilometres away), which are connected to all major cities in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. ;Taxis Pre-paid taxi services are available at the airport. The airport is also serviced by

Uber Uber Technologies, Inc. (Uber), based in San Francisco, provides mobility as a service, ride-hailing (allowing users to book a car and driver to transport them in a way similar to a taxi), food delivery (Uber Eats and Postmates), packa ...

and

Ola Cabs Ola Cabs (stylized as OLΛ) is an Indian multinational ridesharing company, headquartered in Bangalore. It also operates in other business verticals including financial services and cloud kitchens. A variety of venture capitalists including ...

, online cab aggregators providing various options to Calicut city and for Outstation journeys.

Accidents and incidents

* On 17 January 1969, a

Douglas C-47A The Douglas C-47 Skytrain or Dakota ( RAF, RAAF, RCAF, RNZAF, and SAAF designation) is a military transport aircraft developed from the civilian Douglas DC-3 airliner. It was used extensively by the Allies during World War II and remained in ...

VT-DTH of Hindu Publications crashed on take-off. The aircraft was operating a cargo flight. Both crew were killed. At the time the airport had been initialized as an air strip at "Chelari", a few kilometres away from the current location. * On 7 November 2008, Air India Flight 962, an Airbus 310 flying from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, scraped its right wingtip on the runway on landing. Parts of the plane's wing broke, leaving a mark on the runway. * On 9 July 2012, an Air India Express

Boeing 737-800 The Boeing 737 Next Generation, commonly abbreviated as 737NG, or 737 Next Gen, is a narrow-body aircraft powered by two jet engines and produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Launched in 1993 as the third generation derivative of the Boein ...

skidded on landing, during heavy rain. The aircraft's landing gear impacted with runway beacons, breaking them. There were no casualties on board. * On 10 June 2015 an argument between Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) and Airports Authority of India (AAI) personnel at the airport escalated into firearm discharging, leading to one person's death and serious injuries to two others late on Wednesday night. * On 25 April 2017, Air India Flight 937, an

A321-200 suffered an engine failure during takeoff, the aircraft temporarily lost directional control due to asymmetric thrust resulting in a left tyre burst when it impacted the runway edge lighting. The takeoff was aborted and the flight cancelled. * On 4 August 2017, a

SpiceJet SpiceJet is an Indian budget airline headquartered in Gurgaon, Haryana. It is the second largest airline in the country by number of domestic passengers carried, with a market share of 13.6% as of March 2019. The airline operates 630 daily fl ...

Bombardier Dash 8 The De Havilland Canada DHC-8, commonly known as the Dash 8, is a series of turboprop-powered regional airliners, introduced by de Havilland Canada (DHC) in 1984. DHC was later bought by Boeing in 1988, then by Bombardier in 1992; then by ...

skidded on landing and damaged the ILS beacons. * On 7 August 2020,

Air India Express Flight 1344 Air India Express Flight 1344 was a scheduled international flight on 7 August 2020 from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to Kozhikode, India, landing at Calicut International Airport. The flight was part of the Vande Bharat Mission to repatria ...

crashed upon landing at Calicut from

Dubai Dubai (, ; ar, دبي, translit=Dubayy, , ) is the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the capital of the Emirate of Dubai, the most populated of the 7 emirates of the United Arab Emirates.The Government and Politics of ...

during poor weather. After landing, the aircraft, a

, overran the

, skidding off the end of the runway and crashing into a gorge. A total of 21 people, including both pilots, were killed in the crash. 15 people aboard were in critical condition and survived later. The aircraft had been carrying out a repatriation flight under the Vande Bharat Mission.

References

External links

Calicut International Airport
at Airports Authority of India {{Navboxes , title = Articles Related to Calicut International Airport , list = {{Portalbar, India, Aviation {{Airports in India {{Tourism in Kerala {{South Malabar {{Malabar Airports in Kerala Buildings and structures in Malappuram district Transport in Kozhikode Airports established in 1988 1988 establishments in Kerala