Gelephu Airport is located in
Samtenling Gewog, about from the town of
Gelephu
Gelephu ( dz, དགེ་ལེགས་ཕུ་; Wylie: ''dge-legs-phu''), also spelled as Gelyephug, Gelegphu, Gaylegphug or Gaylephug, is a town or Thromde in Sarpang District in Bhutan. It is located on the Indian border, about 30 ...
in
Sarpang District, Bhutan. The airport has been constructed on an area spanning over and came into regular use in late 2017. It is one of only
four airports in Bhutan.
History
The airport was inaugurated in October 2012, but regular scheduled operations were delayed for five years due to its lack of certification from the
Department of Civil Aviation of Bhutan The Department of Civil Aviation, or DCA, is a department of the Royal Government of Bhutan. The department is responsible for regulating aviation safety, airport regulation and providing air navigation services. It is subordinate to the Ministry of ...
and because of funding issues. The airport was originally planned as an
international airport
An international airport is an airport with customs and border control facilities enabling passengers to travel between countries around the world. International airports are usually larger than domestic airports and they must feature longer ...
but the plan was shelved in 2008.
In January 2015, The Department of Civil Aviation told ''
Kuensel
{{Contains special characters, Tibetan
''Kuensel'' ( dz, ཀུན་གསལ།, ''Clarity'') is the national newspaper of the Kingdom of Bhutan. It was the only local newspaper available in Bhutan until 2006 when two more newspapers were la ...
'' that the airport had been closed to scheduled flights due to the need to construct a new terminal building and control tower. A spokesperson said that it was hoped the new structures would be completed in February 2015, and at that point "from our side it’ll be
eady toopen to scheduled flights."
Despite this, it was reported that
Drukair
Drukair Corporation Limited ( dz, འབྲུག་མཁའ་འགྲུལ་ལས་འཛིན།), operating as Drukair — Royal Bhutan Airlines, is the flag carrier of the Kingdom of Bhutan, headquartered in the western dzongkha ...
was not aware of the airport's reopening and stated that it would not launch commercial flights until it had studied the market conditions to ensure scheduled operations were viable.
After a brief period of flights in 2015, which were found to be uneconomic, flights eventually re-commenced in November 2017 with financial support from the Royal Bhutanese Government.
Airlines and destinations
See also
*
Transport in Bhutan Transport in Bhutan uses about of roads and four airports, three of which are operational and interconnected. Paro Airport is the only airport which accommodates international flights. As part of Bhutan's infrastructure modernization programs, it ...
*
List of airports in Bhutan
This is a list of airports in Bhutan, sorted by location.
Bhutan, officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked country in South Asia, located at the eastern end of the Himalaya Mountains and bordered to the south, east and west by the Repu ...
References
{{authority control
Airports in Bhutan