Raleigh County Memorial Airport is three miles east of Beckley, in

Raleigh County, West Virginia Raleigh County is a county in the U.S. state of West Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 74,591. Its county seat is Beckley. The county was founded in 1850 and is named for Sir Walter Raleigh. Raleigh County is included in the ...

, United States. It is owned by the Raleigh County Airport Authority. The airport is used for

general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations with the exception of commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services ...

and sees one scheduled passenger airline, subsidized by the

Essential Air Service Essential Air Service (EAS) is a U.S. government program enacted to guarantee that small communities in the United States, which had been served by certificated airlines prior to deregulation in 1978, maintained commercial service. Its aim is t ...

program.

Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...

records say the airport had 3,630 passenger boardings (enplanements) in

calendar year Generally speaking, a calendar year begins on the New Year's Day of the given calendar system and ends on the day before the following New Year's Day, and thus consists of a whole number of days. A year can also be measured by starting on any o ...

2008, 2,626 in 2009 and 2,429 in 2010. The

National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems The National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems (NPIAS) is an inventory of U.S. aviation infrastructure assets. NPIAS was developed and now maintained by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). It identifies existing and proposed airports tha ...

for 2011–2015 categorized it as a ''non-primary commercial service'' airport based on enplanements in 2008 (between 2,500 and 10,000) but would categorize it as ''general aviation'' based in enplanements in 2010 (under 2,500). The airport opened in 1950–52 with a 4200-foot east–west runway; the first airline flights were Piedmont DC-3s in 1952. (The last Piedmont YS-11 left in 1981.) The runway was extended to 5000 ft in the 1950s, and 6750-ft runway 1 was added between 1975 and 1979. In 2005 the airport was the least busy airport with scheduled airline service in the United States, with 2,578 passengers that year.

Facilities

The airport covers 1,433 acres (580 ha) at an elevation of 2,504 feet (763 m). It has two asphalt runways: 1/19 is 6,750 by 150 feet (2,057 x 46 m) and 10/28 is 5,001 by 100 feet (1,524 x 30 m). In the year ending July 31, 2011 the airport had 21,904 aircraft operations, average 60 per day: 89% general aviation, 7%

air taxi An air taxi is a small commercial aircraft that makes short flights on demand. In 2001 air taxi operations were promoted in the United States by a NASA and aerospace industry study on the potential Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) an ...

, and 4% military. 59 aircraft were then based at the airport: 52.5% single-engine, 30.5% multi-engine, 7% jet, and 10%

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

Airline and destinations

Scheduled passenger service: FedEx Feeder is operated at the field by

Mountain Air Cargo Mountain Air Cargo (MAC) is an American cargo airline based in Denver, North Carolina. It is a major contract carrier for FedEx Express, operating in the eastern United States and the Caribbean region. Previous turboprop operations in South Ameri ...

. UPS Airlines is operated by

Air Cargo Carriers Air Cargo Carriers is a cargo airline based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. ACC was established in 1986 and operates contract feeder cargo services for UPS, FedEx and DHL, additionally providing on demand charter service. Air Cargo Carri ...

Statistics

References

Other sources

* Essential Air Service documents
Docket DOT-OST-1997-2761
from the

U.S. Department of Transportation The United States Department of Transportation (USDOT or DOT) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is headed by the secretary of transportation, who reports directly to the President of the United States and ...

: *
Order 2004-6-14 (June 18, 2004)
selecting Colgan Air, Inc., d/b/a US Airways Express, to continue providing essential air service at Beckley and Bluefield/Princeton, West Virginia, for the two-year period beginning August 1, 2004, at an annual subsidy of $2,017,064. *
Order 2006-7-2 (July 3, 2006)
selecting Colgan Air, Inc., d/b/a US Airways Express, to provide essential air service at Beckley, West Virginia, for a new two-year period beginning August 1, 2006, at a subsidy of $1,930,759 annually. *
Order 2008-6-14 (June 10, 2008)
re-selecting Pinnacle Airlines, Corp. d/b/a Colgan Air, Inc., to continue to provide subsidized essential air service (EAS) at Beckley, West Virginia, for the two-year period beginning August 1, 2008, at the annual subsidy rate of $2,092,844. *
Order 2010-6-25 (June 29, 2010)
re-selecting Colgan Air, Inc. to provide essential air service (EAS) at Clarksburg/Fairmont and Morgantown, WV, for a combined annual subsidy of $2,976,438, and at Beckley, WV, for an annual subsidy of $2,313, 457, for the two-year period from August 1, 2010, through July 31, 2012. Also selecting Gulfstream International Airlines, Inc., to provide EAS at Parkersburg, WV/Marietta, OH, at an annual subsidy rate of $2,642,237, for a two-year period beginning when the carrier inaugurates full EAS through the end of the 24th month thereafter. The total annual subsidy for all four communities is $7,923,132. *
Order 2012-4-32 (April 30, 2012)
selecting Silver Airways to provide Essential Air Service (EAS) at Beckley, Clarksburg/Fairmont ("Clarksburg") and Morgantown, West Virginia, for a combined annual subsidy of $5,968,744 ($2,512,494 for Beckley; $3,456,250 for Clarksburg and Morgantown), for the two-year period beginning when the carrier begins full EAS at all three communities.

External links

*
Aerial image as of April 1996
from

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'' * {{authority control Airports in West Virginia Essential Air Service Buildings and structures in Raleigh County, West Virginia Transportation in Raleigh County, West Virginia Beckley, West Virginia