News Backgrounder
New Istanbul Airport threatens Gulf hubs
November 1st 2018
“Welcome to the biggest and best airport in the world,” IGA CEO, Kadri Samsunlu, said when he welcomed global media to the Turkey’s Istanbul Airport last month. Read More »
IGA, a Turkish consortium under state control and the third largest asset holder in the country, was awarded the contract for the US$10.5 billion construction of the 25-year operation in 2013.
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Building began in 2015 with the goal of making the 200 million passenger airport “strong competition” for the Gulf connector hubs that link the Asia-Pacific to Europe, Africa and the Americas.
Istanbul Airport – it has dropped the “new” – had its soft opening on October 29. Initially, Turkish Airlines will operate a daily flight to Ankara, Antalya, Izmir, Ercan and Baku from the new facility. From December 29, the Star Alliance carrier will move its 330 passenger and cargo aircraft from Ataturk Airport to its new airport home in readiness for full operations on January 1, next year.
Istanbul Airport is an unprecedented airport project. It is larger than Beijing’s Daxing Airport and will have triple the capacity of the obsolete Ataturk Airport.
In the opening phase of operations, the new gateway will operate two runways of 4,100 metres and 3,750 metres, respectively. IGA hopes to have a third runway in service by early 2021 which will lift aircraft movements to 135 an hour.
Samsunlu said last month that a fourth runway would be ready “around 2022” with a fifth and sixth planned for completion by 2028.
All six runways will have CAT-III instrument landing approaches and will be operated in parallel to allow independent take-offs and landings at the same time. IGA said the new airport is the first in Europe to have an end-around runway.
The airport has 114 gates, including 15 that are suitable for the A380, as well as 257 remote parking positions. Ataturk had 146.
“Cargo is important. With a cargo capacity of 4.5 million tonnes annually at the new airport, we will very soon be in competition with the likes of Hong Kong,” the IGA CEO said.
“We have the capacity to handle 30 cargo plans at a time. I am sure Turkish Airlines will soon make announcements on that front,” he told Orient Aviation exclusively.
IGA emphasized the strong focus it is placing on security at the new airport. Nine thousand security cameras have been installed at the airport and perimeter fences are fitted with fibre optic sensors.
The building of Istanbul airport has been controversial. It is alleged 400 workers have died during the project’s construction and that more than 30 remain in jail after protesting about working conditions on the airport site.
Samsunlu said: “We are facing challenges, but it’s normal. We are fixing the problems and are open to peaceful demands. Some things were not right and I took responsibility and action to fix them.
“Things are fine now. It was totally, totally untrue that 400 workers had lost their lives. It is up to the government to decide what happens next.”
Turkish Airlines will have the biggest presence at the airport after being stymied in its expansion plans by Ataturk’s capacity limitations. The situation forced the carrier to defer deliveries of new aircraft.
Turkish Airlines CEO, Bilai Eksi, has identified China and India as the carrier’s most important future markets. “Our main market is India, the second market is China and the third is Canada,” he said.
Turkish plans to recruit more Chinese and Indian partners before it opens more routes. “We are looking for traffic rights to India, China and Canada and we hope we will get more traffic rights,” Eksi said.
Turkish has traffic rights to Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghal. It serves Taipei daily and Hong Kong six times a week. It has a long haul fleet of 33 B777-300ERs and 62 A330s. It has ordered 25 A350-900s with five options and 25 B787-9s also with five options.
