Penang International Airport is an airport in northern Malaysia. The airport is located near

Bayan Lepas Bayan Lepas is a town in the Malaysian state of Penang. It is located within the Southwest Penang Island District, near the southeastern tip of Penang Island. Founded in the 19th century, Bayan Lepas has various industries. History Bayan Le ...

at the southeastern tip of Penang Island, south of the city centre.WMKP – PENANG INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
at Department of Civil Aviation Malaysia Penang International Airport is the third-busiest airport in Malaysia in terms of passenger traffic and the second-busiest in terms of cargo tonnage. The airport is also one of the hubs of the Malaysian

low-cost carrier A low-cost carrier or low-cost airline (occasionally referred to as '' no-frills'', ''budget'' or '' discount carrier'' or ''airline'', and abbreviated as ''LCC'') is an airline that is operated with an especially high emphasis on minimizing op ...

AirAsia Capital A Berhad, () operating as AirAsia (stylized as ''airasia'') is a Malaysian multinational low-cost airline headquartered near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It is the largest airline in Malaysia by fleet size and destinations. AirAsia operat ...

and

Firefly The Lampyridae are a family of elateroid beetles with more than 2,000 described species, many of which are light-emitting. They are soft-bodied beetles commonly called fireflies, lightning bugs, or glowworms for their conspicuous production ...

History

The airport, then named Bayan Lepas International Airport, was completed in 1935, when

Penang Penang ( ms, Pulau Pinang, is a Malaysian state located on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia, by the Malacca Strait. It has two parts: Penang Island, where the capital city, George Town, is located, and Seberang Perai on the M ...

was part of the British crown colony of the

Straits Settlements The Straits Settlements were a group of British territories located in Southeast Asia. Headquartered in Singapore for more than a century, it was originally established in 1826 as part of the territories controlled by the British East India Com ...

. In the 1970s, a major expansion of the airport was carried out, during which a terminal building of Minangkabau architecture was built and the runway extended to accommodate

Boeing 747 The Boeing 747 is a large, long-range wide-body airliner designed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes in the United States between 1968 and 2022. After introducing the 707 in October 1958, Pan Am wanted a jet times its size, ...

s, then the largest passenger jet aircraft. Upon the completion of the expansion works in 1979, the airport was renamed Penang International Airport. In December 2019, MAHB announced a RM800 million expansion plan for the airport, with work on 4 phases starting in March 2020 and to be completed by 2024. This would raise the capacity of the airport from 6.5 million passengers yearly, to 12 million a year. This compares with actual passenger numbers of 9.5 million. However, in May 2020, Chief Minister of Penang Chow Kon Yeow says the planned expansion of the airport might well be by between six months to a year due as a result of the

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quick ...

. On 5 April 2020, Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow said that all international flights into Penang had ceased, although domestic flights continued.

Facilities

The airport became a source of contention between the

Penang state government The Government of Penang ( ms, Kerajaan Negeri Pulau Pinang) refers to the government authority of the Malaysian state of Penang. The state government adheres to and is created by both the Constitution of Malaysia, the supreme law of Malaysia, and ...

and the

Malaysian federal government The Government of Malaysia, officially the Federal Government of Malaysia ( ms, Kerajaan Persekutuan Malaysia), is based in the Federal Territory of Putrajaya with the exception of the legislative branch, which is located in Kuala Lumpur. Malays ...

in recent years, as transportation infrastructure throughout Malaysia falls under the purview of the latter authority. Calls by the Penang state government to expand the airport largely went unheeded by the Malaysian federal government, even though the airport has exceeded its maximum capacity of 6.5 million passengers. In 2017, the federal authorities finally announced plans to expand the airport to accommodate 12 million passengers per year by 2029. The airport expansion was stalled from 2020-2022 due to issues with land acquisition and funding however the Malaysian Transport Ministry has reaffirmed its expansion plans.

Airlines and destinations

Passenger

Cargo

Operational statistics

Penang International Airport is the third busiest airport in the country in terms of passenger traffic after

Kuala Lumpur International Airport Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) is Malaysia's main international airport. It is located in the Sepang District of Selangor, approximately south of Kuala Lumpur and serves the city's greater conurbation. KLIA is the largest and b ...

and Kota Kinabalu International Airport, and handles the second largest cargo tonnage of all Malaysian airports after

. , the airport posted a record 7.23 million tourist arrivals. Notably,

Malaysia Airlines Malaysia Airlines Berhad (MAB; ms, Penerbangan Malaysia Berhad), formerly known as Malaysian Airline System (MAS; ), and branded as Malaysia Airlines, is the flag carrier airline of Malaysia and a member of the Oneworld airline alliance. (The ...

subsidiary,

, has made Penang International Airport one of its main hubs.

, another domestic budget airliner, also operates out of Penang International Airport as one of its secondary hubs.

Ground transportation

Rapid Penang has provided four bus routes to and from Penang International Airport, connecting the airport with various parts of Penang Island. The Rapid Penang routes that pass through the Penang International Airport include: * 102: ''Penang International Airport-Penang National Park-Penang International Airport'' * 306: ''Penang International Airport-Penang General Hospital-Penang International Airport'' * 401: ''Teluk Kumbar-Pengkalan Weld-Teluk Kumbar'' * 401E: ''Balik Pulau-Pengkalan Weld-Balik Pulau'' In addition, as of December 2020, the state government is planning a light-rail project that will connect Penang International Airport and Komtar with 27 intermediate stations.

Incidents

*28 March 1981: Garuda Indonesia Flight 206 refueled at Penang International Airport. During refueling, the hijackers removed an old lady named Hulda Panjaitan from the plane because she kept crying. Subsequently, the plane took off and landed at Don Mueang Airport in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populati ...

. *October 1985: Barlow and Chambers, two British-Australian criminals were caught at the airport, trying to smuggle

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into Australia. Both were arrested and later sentenced to

death Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...

. *9 Jan 2000: Korean Air Cargo Flight 367, a Boeing 747-230F while approaching Runway 22. The aircraft lost a flap section, which punctured the fuselage, causing a 1 m-wide hole. *1 Jan 2020: A bush fire near the airport put authorities on alert, but flights were not delayed by the incident.

References

External links

Penang International Airport
at

Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad () is a Malaysian airport company that manages most of the airports in Malaysia. The firm was recently awarded the duty to manage airports in international destinations. It has its head office in the Malaysia ...

* *
Penang Sentral global website

{{authority control Airports in Penang Northern Corridor Economic Region 1935 establishments in British Malaya Airports established in 1935