Bari Karol Wojtyła Airport
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Bari Karol Wojtyła Airport ( it, Aeroporto di Bari-Karol Wojtyła) is an airport serving the city of
Bari Bari ( , ; nap, label= Barese, Bare ; lat, Barium) is the capital city of the Metropolitan City of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, southern Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy a ...
in Italy. It is approximately northwest from the town centre. Named after
Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...
, who was born Karol Wojtyła, the airport is also known as Palese Airport ( it, Aeroporto di Palese) after a nearby neighbourhood. The airport handled 5 545 588 passengers in 2019 .


History


Early years

The airport of Bari was originally a military airfield, built in the 1930s, by the
Regia Aeronautica The Italian Royal Air Force (''Regia Aeronautica Italiana'') was the name of the air force of the Kingdom of Italy. It was established as a service independent of the Royal Italian Army from 1923 until 1946. In 1946, the monarchy was abolis ...
. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
Italian Campaign, it was seized by the
British Eighth Army The Eighth Army was an Allied field army formation of the British Army during the Second World War, fighting in the North African and Italian campaigns. Units came from Australia, British India, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Free French Forces, ...
in late September 1943, and turned into an Allied military airfield. Until the end of the war in May 1945, it was used by the
Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
and the
United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...
Twelfth and
Fifteenth Air Force The Fifteenth Air Force (15 AF) is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force's Air Combat Command (ACC). It is headquartered at Shaw Air Force Base. It was reactivated on 20 August 2020, merging the previous units of the Ninth Air Force ...
s both as an operational airfield as well as a command and control base. In addition, the airfield was used by the Italian Co-Belligerent Air Force (Aviazione Cobelligerante Italiana, or ACI), or Air Force of the South (Aeronautica del Sud), and the
Balkan Air Force The Balkan Air Force (BAF) was an Allied air formation operating in the Balkans during World War II. Composed of units of the Royal Air Force and South African Air Force under the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces command, it was active from 7 June ...
. After the war, it was turned over to the postwar Air Force of the
Italian Republic Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
(
Aeronautica Militare Italiana , colours = , colours_label = , march = (Ordinance March of the Air Force) by Alberto Di Miniello , mascot = , anniversaries = 28 March ...
). In the 1960s, it was opened to civil flights and
Alitalia Alitalia - Società Aerea Italiana Società per azioni, S.p.A., operating as Alitalia (), was an Italian airline which was once the flag carrier and largest airline of Italy. The company had its head office in Fiumicino, Metropolitan City of ...
schedules regular flights to Rome,
Catania Catania (, , Sicilian and ) is the second largest municipality in Sicily, after Palermo. Despite its reputation as the second city of the island, Catania is the largest Sicilian conurbation, among the largest in Italy, as evidenced also by ...
,
Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...
,
Ancona Ancona (, also , ) is a city and a seaport in the Marche region in central Italy, with a population of around 101,997 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region. The city is located northeast of Rome, on the Adriatic S ...
, Venice. The routes were later taken over by ATI, using a
Fokker F27 The Fokker F27 Friendship is a turboprop airliner developed and manufactured by the Dutch aircraft manufacturer Fokker. It is the most numerous post-war aircraft manufactured in the Netherlands; the F27 was also one of the most successful Euro ...
airplane. When ATI put into operation the new
DC-9-30 The McDonnell Douglas DC-9 is an American five-abreast single-aisle aircraft designed by the Douglas Aircraft Company. It was initially produced by the developer company as the Douglas DC-9 until August 1967 and then by McDonnell Douglas. After ...
it became necessary to create a new runway, while the military complex was still used as passenger terminal. In 1981, a new building was completed, originally intended to be used as a cargo terminal, but it became in fact the airport's new passenger terminal.


Development since the 1990s

In 1990, with the
1990 FIFA World Cup The 1990 FIFA World Cup was the 14th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams. It was held from 8 June to 8 July 1990 in Italy, the second country to host the event for a second time (the first being Me ...
, the runway was extended and the terminal was upgraded, going through a further renovation in 2000. However, the traffic increase showed the infrastructural limitations of the airport and in 2002 the founding stone of the new passenger terminal was laid out. At the same time, flight infrastructures (aircraft parking areas, runway etc.) were upgraded. In 2005, the new terminal was completed and opened to passengers. In 2005, construction works for a new control tower began and they were completed the following year. In 2006, a further extension of the runway was begun, and in 2007, the planning of an extension of the passenger terminals was commissioned. They were upgraded in 2005–2006 with the opening of a new passenger terminal equipped with 4 jet bridges and a multistorey car park.


Airlines and destinations

The following airlines operate regular scheduled, seasonal, and charter flights to and from Bari:


Statistics


Ground transportation


Road

The airport can be reached by the ring road of Bari and from the A14 motorway.


Rail

The
Bari metropolitan railway service The Bari metropolitan railway service is a commuter rail service in the Italian city Bari. It consists of two lines, joining the central railway station, located in the city centre, with the dormitory suburb San Paolo (line FM1) and with the â ...
connects the Airport with the
Bari Centrale railway station Bari Centrale is the main railway station of the Italian city of Bari, capital of Apulia. It is one of the most important railway stations in Italy, with an annual ridership of 14 million. History The station was first built in 1864 and betwee ...
in the city centre.


Bus

AMTAB buses provide public transportation to the airport from the city centre (Line 16). Pugliairbus is a seasonal bus transportation service which operates interconnection service with Brindisi and Foggia airports. Pugliairbus also reaches touristic locations.


Accidents and incidents

* On 6 August 2005,
Tuninter Flight 1153 Tuninter Flight 1153 (UG1153/TUX1153) was a Sevenair, Tuninter Airlines international flight from Bari International Airport in Bari, Italy, to Djerba-Zarzis Airport in Djerba, Tunisia. On 6 August 2005, the Tuninter ATR 72 ditched into the Medi ...
, a
Tuninter Tunisair Express (french: Société des Lignes Intérieures et Internationales, ar, الخطوط التونسية السريعة) is an airline based in Tunis, Tunisia that was founded on 1 August 1991. Formerly known as Tuninter ( ar, الخط ...
ATR 72 en route from Bari to
Djerba Djerba (; ar, جربة, Jirba, ; it, Meninge, Girba), also transliterated as Jerba or Jarbah, is a Tunisian island and the largest island of North Africa at , in the Gulf of Gabès, off the coast of Tunisia. It had a population of 139,544 a ...
,
Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...
, ditched into the
Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...
about from the city of
Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...
. Sixteen of the thirty-nine people on board died. The accident resulted from engine
fuel starvation In an internal combustion engine, fuel starvation is the failure of the fuel system to supply sufficient fuel to allow the engine to run properly, for example due to blockage, vapor lock, contamination by water, malfunction of the fuel pump or in ...
. During maintenance the fuel quantity indicator (FQI) was changed using an FQI for an ATR 42 instead of an ATR 72.


See also

*
Kraków John Paul II International Airport Kraków John Paul II International Airport ( pl, Kraków Airport im. Jana Pawła II since 4 September 2007; earlier in pl, Międzynarodowy Port Lotniczy im. Jana Pawła II Kraków–Balice) is an international airport located near Kraków, in t ...
*
João Paulo II Airport Ponta Delgada - João Paulo II Airport , named after Pope John Paul II, is an international airport located on the island of São Miguel, in the Portuguese archipelago of the Azores. Situated west of the city centre of Ponta Delgada, it is the ...
Ponta Delgada (Azores) *
List of airports in Italy This is a list of airports in Italy, grouped by Regions of Italy, region and sorted by location. Airports Airport names shown in bold have scheduled passenger service on commercial airlines. See also * Transport in Italy * List of airports by ...


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bari Karol Wojtyla Airport Airports in Apulia Airport, International Buildings and structures in the Province of Bari Pope John Paul II Italian airbases