Airport History - Belfast Airport Car Parking from SkyParkSecure
History of Belfast Airport
The Beginning:
November 1917
Aldergrove selected to be the Royal Flying Corps training establishment during the First World War. With the end of the war, Aldergrove remained open for Royal Air Force aircraft and for the fledgling civil traffic to and from Northern Ireland.
June 1921
King George V and Queen Mary visited Northern Ireland. Aircraft landed at Aldergrove with cameramen and reporters and returned to London with newsreel films and photographs of the event.
May 1925
Northern Ireland's own Special Reserve unit No 502 (Ulster) Squadron RAF was formed at Aldergrove.
31 May 1933
Northern Ireland's first ever regular, sustained civil air service started. The route was Glasgow to Aldergrove and the flight was operated by Midland and Scottish Air Ferries.
1933-1934
Aldergrove became Northern Ireland's civil airport.
20 August 1934
Northern Ireland's first London service began to Nutts Corner, operated by Railway Air Services. The flight left from Croydon and went via Birmingham and Manchester to Belfast.
1939-45
During the second World War, Aldergrove remained an RAF base, particularly for the Coastal Command.
1946-63
The decision was taken to move civil flights back to Aldergrove because of less variable weather conditions than those at Nutts Corner. In recent years aircraft had been diverted from Nutts Corner to Aldergrove because of adverse weather conditions.
26 Sept 1963
Operations were transferred from Nutts Corner to Aldergrove. The first passenger flight to land that day was a BEA Viscount from Manchester.
28 Oct 1963
HRH Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother reopened Aldergrove as a civil airport and inaugurated the present terminal building.
4 January 1966
The start of the first regular jet service, by a British United BAC 1-11 to Gatwick.
1968
Aer Lingus and BOAC started scheduled services to New York via Shannon and Prestwick respectively.
1969
Annual passenger numbers hit the 1 million mark.
1970
The Minister of Development revealed a £3million expansion plan for the airport which included the extension of the main runway by over 3,000 ft.
1 Jun 1971
The newly formed Northern Ireland Airports Limited took over operation of the airport from the UK Department of Trade and Industry.
1 April 1977
British Airways launch the first Belfast Heathrow shuttle service.
3 Jul 1977
The first Jumbo jet operates from Aldergrove on a charter service to Toronto via Shannon.
1980
The first scheduled service to a European city was started by NLM Cityhopper which operated flights to Amsterdam.
1983
Work finished on the second stage of the long term development plan which included the completion of the dedicated international pier, relocation of the check-in area and the installation of the moving walkway.
1983
The airport was renamed Belfast International.
1984
Annual passenger numbers hit the 1.5 million mark.
26 Mar 1984
British Midland went into competition with BA on the Heathrow route.
1987
The new Executive Aviation Terminal was opened.
1987
Annual passenger numbers hit the 2 million mark.
17 July 1991
The new cargo centre was officially opened.
20 July 1994
Belfast International Airport was privatised following a management buy-out resulting in the creation of Belfast International Airport Holdings Ltd.
30 November 1995
Air Force One landed at Belfast International carrying the former US President and First Lady, Bill and Hilary Clinton.
13 August 1996
Belfast International was bought by TBI.
1998
easyJet started operations from the airport.
1999
Annual passenger numbers hit the 3 million mark.
21 Oct 2003
Concorde touches down at Belfast International on its final farewell tour.
2004
Annual passenger numbers reached 4.5 million mark.
5 Jan 2005
The TBI group is bought over by ACDL.
