Yeouido Airport was 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 ...

Yeouido Yeouido (Hangul: 여의도, en, Yoi Island or Yeoui Island) is a large island (or eyot) on the Han River in Seoul, South Korea. It is Seoul's main finance and investment banking district. Its 8.4 square kilometers are home to some 30,988 people ...

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

. It operated as an international airport from 1929 to 1958, and thereafter as a military base until 1971.

History

The

Imperial Japanese Army The was the official ground-based armed force of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945. It was controlled by the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff Office and the Ministry of the Army, both of which were nominally subordinate to the Emperor o ...

constructed an airstrip on

in 1916. At the time, the island was predominantly farmland but was also used as an Imperial Army training base. Japanese authorities significantly upgraded the facility in 1929, along with a number of other airfields in Korea, to serve as stops for air service to

Manchuria Manchuria is an exonym (derived from the endo demonym " Manchu") for a historical and geographic region in Northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day Northeast China (Inner Manchuria) and parts of the Russian Far East (Outer Manc ...

Imperial Japanese Airways was the national airline of the Empire of Japan during World War II. History With the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War, there was a tremendous need for air transport capability by the Japanese military, which had traditionally drawn on th ...

provided scheduled flights to Tokyo, Fukuoka, Mukden, Dalian, Hsinking and other destinations from the airport during the 1930s. The much larger

Kimpo Airfield Gimpo International Airport (), commonly known as Gimpo Airport , formerly rendered in English as Kimpo International Airport, is located in the far western end of Seoul, some west of the Central District of Seoul. Gimpo was the main interna ...

opened to Japanese military traffic in 1943, and Yeouido was thereafter officially known as Keijo No. 2 Airfield (京城第2飛行場). After World War II, the airfield became a base of operations for

Korean National Airlines Korean National Airlines (KNA) was the first (commercial cargo and passenger) air carrier in Korea. Established in 1946 and incorporated in 1948 in South Korea, and its first official passenger flight was from Seoul to Pusan on October 30, 1948 ...

(KNA/Koreanair), which operated international flights to Hong Kong and domestic flights to

Pusan Busan (), officially known as is South Korea's most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.4 million inhabitants. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economic, cultural and educational center of southeastern South Korea, w ...

Kangnung Gangneung () is a municipal city in the province of Gangwon-do, on the east coast of South Korea. It has a population of 213,658 (as of 2017).Gangneung City (2003)Population & Households. Retrieved January 14, 2006. Gangneung is the economic ...

Kwangju Gwangju () is South Korea's sixth-largest metropolis. It is a designated metropolitan city under the direct control of the central government's Home Minister. The city was also the capital of South Jeolla Province until the provincial office ...

and Cheju.

Northwest Orient Airlines Northwest Airlines Corp. (NWA) was a major American airline founded in 1926 and absorbed into Delta Air Lines, Inc. by a merger. The merger, approved on October 29, 2008, made Delta the largest airline in the world until the American Airlines ...

operated Seoul-Tokyo flights in the 1950s, providing onward connections to North America. The airport was prone to flooding that made it unusable during the summer

rainy season The rainy season is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. Rainy Season may also refer to: * ''Rainy Season'' (short story), a 1989 short horror story by Stephen King * "Rainy Season", a 2018 song by Monni * ''T ...

Gimpo International Airport Gimpo International Airport (), commonly known as Gimpo Airport , formerly rendered in English as Kimpo International Airport, is located in the far western end of Seoul, some west of the Central District of Seoul. Gimpo was the main interna ...

took over Yeouido's commercial flights in 1958, and

Seoul Air Base Seoul Air Base (sometimes K-16 Air Base, Seoul Airport or Seongnam Air Base) is located in Seongnam city near Seoul in South Korea. Runway 19 and 20 are equipped with an ILS. History Korea under Japanese rule constructed 여의도 비행장(Ye ...

took over its military functions in 1971.

Former Airlines and Destinations (before 1958)

Imperial Japanese Airways operated until 1945 when operations ceased by US occupation. KNA operated from 1948 onwards. Northwest began service in 1947 when civil flights resumed in Japan.

References

Defunct airports Airports in South Korea Airports established in 1916 Buildings and structures demolished in 1971 Korean War air bases Yeouido 1971 disestablishments in South Korea {{SouthKorea-airport-stub