Boca Raton Airport is a state-owned public-use

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial Aviation, air transport. They usually consist of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surf ...

located two miles (3 km) northwest of the

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides wit ...

Boca Raton Boca Raton ( ; ) is a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The population was 97,422 in the 2020 United States census, 2020 census and it ranked as the 23rd-largest city in Florida in 2022. Many people with a Boca Raton Address, ...

, a city in

Palm Beach County Palm Beach County is a county in the southeastern part of Florida, located in the Miami metropolitan area. It is Florida's third-most populous county after Miami-Dade County and Broward County and the 24th-most populous in the United States, wi ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The airport is immediately adjacent to

Florida Atlantic University Florida Atlantic University (Florida Atlantic or FAU) is a Public university, public research university with its main campus in Boca Raton, Florida, United States. The university is a member of the State University System of Florida and has s ...

and to

Interstate 95 Interstate 95 (I-95) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the East Coast of the United States, running from U.S. Route 1 (US 1) in Miami, Florida, north to the Houlton–Woodstock Border Crossing between Maine and the ...

. Boca Raton Airport is publicly owned and is designated as a general aviation transport facility governed by a seven-member Authority appointed by the City of Boca Raton and

Commission.Boca Raton Airport Authority
URL retrieved April 5, 2006

Facilities and aircraft

Boca Raton Airport covers an area of and has one

asphalt Asphalt most often refers to: * Bitumen, also known as "liquid asphalt cement" or simply "asphalt", a viscous form of petroleum mainly used as a binder in asphalt concrete * Asphalt concrete, a mixture of bitumen with coarse and fine aggregates, u ...

-paved

runway In aviation, a runway is an elongated, rectangular surface designed for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft. Runways may be a human-made surface (often asphalt concrete, asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both) or a natural surface (sod, ...

designated 5/23, which measures 6,276 × 150 ft (1,913 × 46 m). The airport has a control tower which is staffed from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. There are two full-service fixed-base operators, Signature Flight Support and Atlantic Aviation. The Burton D. Morgan School of Aeronautic of

Lynn University Lynn University is a private university in Boca Raton, Florida, United States. Founded in 1962, the university awards Associate degree, associate, Bachelor's degree, baccalaureate, Master's degree, master's, and Doctorate, doctoral Academic degr ...

is located at the airport. For the 12-month period ending December 31, 2020, the airport had 81,550 aircraft operations, an average of 223 per day: 93%

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

, 6%

air taxi An air taxi is a small commercial aircraft that makes short flights on demand. History The concept of air taxis existed as early as the 1910s. This concept goes back as early as 1917 with Glenn Curtiss’ prototype, the auto-plane. Furthermor ...

and <1%

military A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. Militaries are typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with their members identifiable by a d ...

. At that time there were 242 aircraft based at this airport: 130 single-

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ge ...

, 27 multi-engine, 82 jet and 3

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...

History

Beginnings

: ''See

Boca Raton Army Airfield Boca Raton Army Air Field was a World War II United States Army Air Forces airfield, located northwest of the 1940s borders of Boca Raton, Florida. During World War II, it operated the only training for the then new and secret technology of ra ...

for the military use of the airport during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

'' Boca Raton Airport was established in 1936. In 1941, in response to the emerging

Axis An axis (: axes) may refer to: Mathematics *A specific line (often a directed line) that plays an important role in some contexts. In particular: ** Coordinate axis of a coordinate system *** ''x''-axis, ''y''-axis, ''z''-axis, common names ...

threat, the United States began to rapidly mobilize and expand its armed forces. In addition to enlarging its Army and Navy, the US also sought to expand its air forces. The service we know today as the

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 ...

was known prior to June 1941 as the

U.S. Army Air Corps The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) was the aerial warfare service component of the United States Army between 1926 and 1941. After World War I, as early aviation became an increasingly important part of modern warfare, a philosophical ri ...

and after June 1941 as the

U.S. 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 ...

, and was a subordinate branch within the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of the United Stat ...

. To expand the air corps/air forces, new air bases were established throughout the United States, including bases in southern Florida at Homestead, Morrison Field in

West Palm Beach West Palm Beach is a city in and the county seat of Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. It is located immediately to the west of the adjacent Palm Beach, Florida, Palm Beach, which is situated on a barrier island across the Lake Worth Lag ...

, and

Airport. Boca Raton Airport, also known as Boca Raton Army Airfield, was selected to house a military airfield for a number of geographic and practical reasons. Southern Florida's

climate Climate is the long-term weather pattern in a region, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteoro ...

and physical geography are generally considered mild compared to most northern locations. Florida experiences a winter climate characteristic of the

subtropics The subtropical zones or subtropics are geographical and climate zones immediately to the north and south of the tropics. Geographically part of the temperate zones of both hemispheres, they cover the middle latitudes from to approximately ...

. Lacking snow or low temperatures enabled military operations to continue year round. Florida also has consistently flat terrain, an ideal feature when training new and inexperienced pilots. Its location adjacent to the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

and the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

also provided ideal locations for flight training. Boca Raton was also chosen for practical purposes. In the early-1940s, Boca Raton's population numbered only 723. This enabled the

government to take thousands of acres of land for its use without having to relocate a large number of people. However, this is not to say that the establishment of the military airfield was without controversy. A majority of the land was acquired from

Japanese American are Americans of Japanese ancestry. Japanese Americans were among the three largest Asian Americans, Asian American ethnic communities during the 20th century; but, according to the 2000 United States census, 2000 census, they have declined in ...

farmers from the failing Yamato Colony, the land having been seized through the process of

eminent domain Eminent domain, also known as land acquisition, compulsory purchase, resumption, resumption/compulsory acquisition, or expropriation, is the compulsory acquisition of private property for public use. It does not include the power to take and t ...

, leaving many Japanese Americans little recourse in the early days of World War II. All of these conditions enabled construction of the military airfield to commence in June 1942.

After World War 2

While most of the Boca Raton Army Air Field was deactivated in 1946, more than were retained as the Boca Raton Air Force Auxiliary Field. Another were used in the 1950s for a secret project to produce

stem rust Stem rust, also known as cereal rust, black rust, red rust or red dust, is caused by the fungus ''Puccinia graminis'', which causes significant disease in cereal crops. Crop species that are affected by the disease include bread wheat, durum wh ...

spore In biology, a spore is a unit of sexual reproduction, sexual (in fungi) or asexual reproduction that may be adapted for biological dispersal, dispersal and for survival, often for extended periods of time, in unfavourable conditions. Spores fo ...

s for possible use as a

biological agent Biological agents, also known as biological weapons or bioweapons, are pathogens used as weapons. In addition to these living or replicating pathogens, toxins and Toxin#Biotoxins, biotoxins are also included among the bio-agents. More than 1,2 ...

against

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

production in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. Other parts of the World War II air base were returned to private ownership and developed. In 1959 the remainder of the base was turned over to the City of Boca Raton and to the State of Florida. and a single runway (of three original runways), completely rebuilt, became Boca Raton Airport. The remaining land became the campus of

Recent history

The airport's first control tower opened in 2000. The tower was named after Philip Modder, who was the Chairman of the Boca Raton Airport Authority. Philip “Phil” Modder had pushed for Boca Raton, with its growing traffic of corporate jets, to have its own tower. The airport suffered more than $12 million worth of damage to hangars when

Hurricane Wilma Hurricane Wilma was the most intense tropical cyclone in the Atlantic basin and the second-most intense tropical cyclone in the Western Hemisphere, both based on barometric pressure, after Hurricane Patricia in 2015. Wilma's rapid intensifi ...

passed through the area in October 2005. In 1997, the restored original

Aston Martin Aston Martin Lagonda Global Holdings PLC () is a British manufacturer of Luxury car, luxury sports cars and grand tourers. Its predecessor was founded in 1913 by Lionel Martin and Robert Bamford. Headed from 1947 by David Brown (entrepreneur ...

DB5 "Effects Car" from the

James Bond The ''James Bond'' franchise focuses on James Bond (literary character), the titular character, a fictional Secret Intelligence Service, British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels ...

film " Goldfinger" was stolen from a hangar at Boca Raton airport. A

U.S. Customs and Border Protection United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is the largest federal law enforcement agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security. It is the country's primary border control organization, charged with regulating and facilita ...

facility was scheduled to open in 2017 in order to allow Boca Raton Airport to process passengers arriving on international flights. Boca Raton Airport's Customs and Border Protection facility opened in May 2018.

Major accidents at or near BCT

*On August 8, 1956, a ''Sky Spray''

Fairchild C-82 Packet The C-82 Packet is a twin-engine, twin-boom cargo aircraft designed and built by Fairchild Aircraft. It was used briefly by the United States Army Air Forces and the successor United States Air Force following World War II. Design and developm ...

returning from a spraying mission experienced smoke coming from the #2 engine and a loss of power from the #1 engine on final approach to then Boca Raton Air Force Auxiliary Field. The aircraft in a banking manoeuvre lost control and crashed. All 5 occupants (2 crew, 3 passengers) died. *On June 23, 2000, a ''Universal Jet Aviation''

Learjet 55 The Learjet 55 "Longhorn" is an American business jet manufactured by Learjet. Development and design The Learjet 50 series was first announced at the 1977 Paris Air Show with larger cabins than existing Learjets. The series was to have three va ...

on a

Visual flight rules In aviation, visual flight rules (VFR) is a set of regulations under which a pilot operates an aircraft in weather conditions generally clear enough to allow the pilot to see where the aircraft is going. Specifically, the weather must be better tha ...

(VFR) climb from BCT collided at an altitude of 2,400 feet 2.8 miles SW of Boca Raton with an

Extra EA-300 The Extra Flugzeugbau EA300 is a two-seat aerobatics, aerobatic monoplane capable of Unlimited category Competition aerobatics, competition. It was designed in 1987 in aviation, 1987 by Walter Extra, a German people, German aerobatic pilot, an ...

S which took off from

Pompano Beach Airpark The Pompano Beach Airpark is a public airport located one mile (1.6 km) northeast of the central business district of Pompano Beach, in Broward County, Florida, United States. The airport is publicly owned by the City of Pompano Beach. T ...

. Both aircraft crashed to the ground. All 3 occupants (2 crew, 1 passenger) on the Learjet 55 were killed along with the sole occupant of the Extra EA-300S. *On April 11, 2025, a

Cessna 310 The Cessna 310 is an American four-to-six-seat, low-wing, twin-engine monoplane produced by Cessna between 1954 and 1980. It was the second twin-engine aircraft that Cessna put into production; the first was the Cessna T-50. It was used by the ...

reported having mechanical issues shortly after takeoff from BCT, causing it to crash into

. All three occupants of the plane were killed and one person on the ground was injured.

Airline and destinations

References

External links

Boca Raton Airport Authority
* brochure fro
CFASPP
* * {{Authority control Airports in Palm Beach County, Florida 1936 establishments in Florida Airports established in 1936 Buildings and structures in Boca Raton, Florida