Quatro de Fevereiro International Airport ( pt, Aeroporto Internacional 4 de Fevereiro, sw, Uwanja wa Ndege wa Kimataifa wa Quatro de Fevereiro), is the main international airport of

Angola , national_anthem = " Angola Avante"() , image_map = , map_caption = , capital = Luanda , religion = , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , coordina ...

. It is located in the southern part of the capital

Luanda Luanda () is the Capital (political), capital and largest city in Angola. It is Angola's primary port, and its major Angola#Economy, industrial, Angola#Culture, cultural and Angola#Demographics, urban centre. Located on Angola's northern Atl ...

, situated in the

Luanda Province Luanda is a province of Angola. It covers an area of 18,835 km2, and had a population of 6,945,386 at the Census of 16 May 2014. The latest official estimate (for 2019) is 8,247,688.Instituto Nacional de Estatístiica, República de Angola. The ...

. ''Quatro de Fevereiro'' means 4th of February, which is an important national holiday in Angola, marking the start of the armed struggle against the Portuguese colonial regime on 4 February 1961. In 2009, about 1.8 million passengers were counted.

History

The construction of the airport began in 1951, in order to serve the capital of the former-Portuguese Overseas Province of Angola. It was inaugurated in 1954, by the Portuguese President

Craveiro Lopes Francisco Higino Craveiro Lopes (; 12 April 1894 – 2 September 1964) was a Portuguese Air Force officer and politician who served as the 12th president of Portugal from 1951 to 1958. Early life and career Born in Lisbon, he was a son o ...

, which in his honor, the airport was named ''Aeroporto Presidente Craveiro Lopes'' (President Craveiro Lopes Airport). In August, September, and October 1975 the airport hosted tens of thousands of mostly white Portuguese Angolans fleeing to Lisbon (during ''Operation Air Bridge'') who camped-out while awaiting evacuation flights during the weeks before Angola's Independence. Following Angola's independence from Portugal (in November 1975), the airport was renamed ''Aeroporto Quatro de Fevereiro Internacional'' (Fourth of February International Airport) to commemorate the events leading to the independence of the state.

Facilities

The airport is at an elevation of above

mean sea level There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the '' ari ...

. It has two

asphalt Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term ...

paved

runway According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt, concre ...

s: 05/23 is and 07/25 is .Airport information for FNLU
from

DAFIF DAFIF () or the ''Digital Aeronautical Flight Information File'' is a comprehensive database of up-to-date aeronautical data, including information on airports, airways, airspaces, navigation data, and other facts relevant to flying in the entire w ...

(effective October 2006) Starting no earlier than 2022, the airport will be replaced by the new Angola International Airport. Construction work has already started, but its opening was postponed due to financial difficulties on the part of the Angolan government.

Airlines and destinations

The following airlines operate regular scheduled and charter flights at Luanda Quatro de Fevereiro Airport:

Statistics

Accidents and incidents

* On 26 March 1979, a cargo-configured

Interflug Interflug GmbH (german: Interflug Gesellschaft für internationalen Flugverkehr m.b.H.; ) was the national airline of the German Democratic Republic from 1963 to 1990. Based in East Berlin, it operated scheduled and chartered flights to Europea ...

Ilyushin Il-18 DM-STL overshot the runway following an engine failure during the take-off run. The aircraft broke up and erupted into flames, killing the ten people on board. *On 12 February 2000, a

Transafrik International Transafrik International is a cargo airline based in Angola with its offices in Fujairah, United Arab Emirates.Boeing 727 The Boeing 727 is an American narrow-body airliner that was developed and produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. After the heavy 707 quad-jet was introduced in 1958, Boeing addressed the demand for shorter flight lengths from smaller airpo ...

crashed upon landing on runway 23. Due to high winds gusting to between 50 and 80 knots, the aircraft had executed a missed approach, and upon the landing flare of the second attempt, witnesses saw the right wing touch the ground. *On 25 May 2003, a Boeing 727-223 with the registration number N844AA, which had been parked at the airport for over a year, was stolen in mysterious circumstances, and has never been found as of August 2022. *On 27 June 2009, a

British Airways British Airways (BA) is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in London, England, near its main hub at Heathrow Airport. The airline is the second largest UK-based carrier, based on fleet size and passengers ...

Boeing 777-200ER The Boeing 777, commonly referred to as the Triple Seven, is an American long-range wide-body airliner developed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the world's largest twinjet. The 777 was designed to bridge the gap betw ...

G-RAES was damaged, while it was parked, by a collision with a

Hainan Airlines Hainan Airlines Co., Ltd. (HNA, ) is an airline headquartered in Haikou, Hainan, People's Republic of China. The airline is rated as a 5-star airline by Skytrax. It is the largest civilian-run and majority state-owned air transport company, ...

Airbus A340-600 The Airbus A340 is a long-range, wide-body passenger airliner that was developed and produced by Airbus. In the mid-1970s, Airbus conceived several derivatives of the A300, its first airliner, and developed the A340 quadjet in parallel wi ...

B-6510. *On 31 January 2010, Guicango

Yakovlev Yak-40 The Yakovlev Yak-40 (russian: Яковлев Як-40; NATO reporting name: Codling) is a regional jet designed by Yakovlev. The trijet's maiden flight was in 1966, and it was in production from 1967 to 1981. Introduced in September 1968, the ...

D2-FES suffered the collapse of all landing gears on landing after a flight from Cabinda.

References

External links

* *
Luanda Airport website
by the operator ENANA EP {{authority control

Buildings and structures in Luanda Airports established in 1954 1954 establishments in Angola