WARSAW FREDERIC CHOPIN AIRPORT

'Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport' (Polish: ''Port Lotniczy im. Fryderyka Chopina'') is an international airport located in the Okęcie district of Warsaw, Poland. Formerly called 'Okęcie International Airport', it is now named after the famous Polish composer and former Warsaw resident, Frédéric Chopin. It is Poland's largest airport, handling more than 50% of the country's air passenger traffic.
Note that the previous name, ''lotnisko Okęcie'' (Okęcie airport) is still in common use in the everyday and semi-official language.
At present, Warsaw Airport handles approximately 100 daily scheduled flights to/from major airports in Poland and worldwide, and the number of its charter connections is always increasing. London, Frankfurt, Paris and Amsterdam are the busiest connections internationally, with Krakow, Wrocław and Gdańsk domestically.

Contents

History

Statistics

Information About Terminals 1 & 2

Future second airport

Runways

Airlines and destinations

Terminal 1 & 2

Etiuda Terminal

Domestic Terminal

Cargo Airlines

Accidents and Incidents

See also

References

External links

History

The land was used for aviation since 1910, while in 1927 it was decided that Okęcie would become the city's primary airport. After the completion of technical buildings and the passenger terminal in 1934, the airport took over the handling of all traffic from the Pole Mokotowskie airfield. Apart from LOT Polish Airlines, Okęcie was also home to four squadrons of the Polish Air Force and to aircraft manufacturer Doświadczalne Zakłady Lotnicze.
During World War II the airport infrastructure was almost completely destroyed. In 1969 a new international terminal was opened; domestic flights continued to operate from the facilities built on the site of the pre-war terminal. The current two-story Terminal 1 was constructed in 1992 to replace the separate domestic and international terminals. The latter has since been mostly torn down with the arrivals hall being adapted in 2003 to become the Etiuda Terminal for low cost carriers.

Statistics

Statistics of passenger traffic 1995-2006 posted on the airport's official webpage:[2]

★ 1995-2,735,469

★ 1996-3,090,321

★ 1997-3,484,452

★ 1998-3,815,624

★ 1999-3,997,531

★ 2000-4,325,814

★ 2001-4,713,655

★ 2002-4,936,835

★ 2003-5,166,991

★ 2004-6,085,111

★ 2005-7,071,881

★ 2006-8,101,827

Information About Terminals 1 & 2

The construction of a second terminal, which will triple the airport's capacity, is currently underway. Terminal 2's Arrivals Hall was opened on December 1 2006, Terminal 2's Central and South Piers should open at the end of November 2007.^[2]
Currently, departing passengers check in at Terminal 1, which is likely to be turned into a low-cost or a domestic terminal in the future upon completion of Terminal 2. Arriving flights already use Terminal 2.

Future second airport

Warsaw may see its second passenger airport in 2009. A former military airfield is awaiting transformation into a low-cost scheduled and charter flights airport (with cargo capabilities to be added later) in order to off-load Frederic Chopin Airport. The new airport is located 40 km north of Warsaw centre, in Modlin, and the first aircraft operation is expected in the winter of 2009 at the earliest. This airport has been talked about for many years, with its projected completion date slipping repeatedly. Modlin airport will serve 2-3 million passengers annually.

Runways

The airport has two intersecting concrete runways, 2800 by 50 meters and 3690 by 60 meters. Usually the latter one is used.

Airlines and destinations

Terminal 1 & 2

★ Adria Airways (Ljubljana)

★ Aer Lingus (Cork, Dublin)

★ Aeroflot (Moscow-Sheremetyevo)

★ Aerosvit Airlines (Kiev-Boryspil)

★ Air Europa (Madrid)

★ Air France (Paris-Charles de Gaulle)

★ Alitalia

★
★ operated by Alitalia Express (Milan-Malpensa, Rome-Fiumicino)

★ Austrian Airlines

★
★ operated by Austrian Arrows (Vienna)

★ Belavia (Minsk)

★ Blue1 (Helsinki)

★ British Airways (London-Heathrow)

★ Brussels Airlines (Brussels)

★ Centralwings (Bologna, Bourgas, Catania, Cork, Chania, Dublin [starts 16 October 2007], Edinburgh, Faro, Grenoble [starts 1 December 2007], Heraklion, Lille, Lisbon, London-Gatwick, London-Stansted, Malaga, Malta, Manchester [Starts October 28, 2007] Palma Mallorca, Palermo, Rhodes, Rome-Ciampino, Shannon, Thessaloniki, Varna) ''Centralwings is in the process of moving its operations to Etiuda Terminal; right now it is using both Etiuda and Terminal 1 for some destinations''

★ Clickair (Barcelona)

★ Czech Airlines (Prague)

★ El Al (Tel Aviv)

★ Eurocypria Airlines (Larnaca)

★ Finnair (Helsinki)

★ Iberia (Madrid) [Starts October 28,2007]

★ KLM (Amsterdam)

★
★ KLM operated by KLM Cityhopper (Amsterdam)

★ LOT Polish Airlines (Amsterdam, Athens, Barcelona, Beijing [Starts March 30 2008], Beirut (seasonal), Brussels, Bucharest-Otopeni, Budapest, Chicago-O'Hare, Copenhagen, Dublin [Ends October 15 2007], Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Geneva, Hamburg, Hanover [Starts October 28 2007], Helsinki, Istanbul-Atatürk, Kiev-Boryspil, Larnaca, Ljubljana, London-Heathrow, Lyon, Madrid, Manchester, Milan-Malpensa, Minsk, Moscow-Sheremetyevo, Munich, New York-JFK, Newark, Nice, Odessa, Oslo, Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Prague, Riga, Rome-Fiumicino, Sofia, St. Petersburg, Stockholm-Arlanda, Stuttgart, Tallinn, Tel Aviv, Toronto-Pearson, Venice, Vienna, Zürich)

★
★ operated by Eurolot (Berlin-Tegel, Kaliningrad, Lviv, Prague, Vilnius)

★ Lufthansa (Frankfurt)

★
★ Lufthansa Regional operated by Lufthansa CityLine (Düsseldorf, Munich)

★
★ Lufthansa Regional operated by Eurowings (Düsseldorf)

★ Malév Hungarian Airlines (Budapest)

★ SAS Scandinavian Airlines (Copenhagen)

★ Swiss International Air Lines (Basel/Mulhouse, Zürich)

★ Turkish Airlines (Istanbul-Atatürk)

Etiuda Terminal

Low cost carriers (of late, partly including Centralwings) use the Etiuda terminal. It is smaller and its facilities are rudimentary, and accordingly, its airport taxes are lower. Airlines using Etiuda terminal depart from the terminal and arrive at terminal 2.

★ Air Italy (Verona)

★ Centralwings (Lisbon, London-Stansted, Rome-Ciampino and others) ''Centralwings also still uses Terminal 1 for some flights''

★ easyJet (Bristol [starts 2 October 2007], London-Luton)

★ Germanwings (Cologne/Bonn, Stuttgart)

★ Norwegian Air Shuttle (Alicante, Athens, Bergen, Birmingham, Copenhagen, Malaga, Munich [starts 28 October 2007], Oslo, Rygge [Starts March 14, 2008], Rome-Fiumicino, Salzburg [starts 29 December 2007], Stavanger [starts 31 October 2007], Stockholm-Arlanda)

★ Ryanair (Dublin)

★ Sky Europe (Paris-Orly, Vienna [Starts October 28,2007])

★ Wizz Air (Belfast, Bourgas, Brussels-Charleroi, Budapest , Corfu, Dortmund, Durham Tees Valley, Glasgow-Prestwick, Gothenburg Saeve, Grenoble/Lyon [Starts December 1,2007], Hahn, Liverpool, London-Luton, Malmö, Milan-Bergamo [Starts December 8,2007], Oslo-Torp, Paris-Beauvais, Stockholm-Skavsta)

Domestic Terminal

The domestic terminal is located within Terminal 1.

★ LOT Polish Airlines

★
★ operated by Eurolot (Bydgoszcz, Gdańsk, Katowice, Kraków, Poznań, Rzeszów, Szczecin, Wrocław)

★
★ operated by Jet Air (Bydgoszcz, Łódź, Katowice, Kraków, Zielona Góra)

Cargo Airlines

★ Apatas

★ DHL

★ FedEx

★ Rivne Universal Avia

★ TNT Airways

★ UPS

★ White Eagle Aviation

Accidents and Incidents

★ On December 19 1962 a LOT Polish Airlines Vickers Viscount 804 crashed on 2nd approach before the runway 33 threshold while performing an instrument landing at night in fog in winter. All aboard died - 33 people.

★ On March 14 1980 and May 9 1987 two LOT Polish Airlines Ilyushin Il-62 aircraft crashed on approach (the latter returning to the airport) due to catastrofic contagious engine failure caused by engine design and manufacturing faults. All people on board died, 87 and 183, respectively.

★ On September 14 1993 Lufthansa Flight 2904,an Airbus 320-200 overran the runway and crashed into an embankment upon landing on a flight from Frankfurt in heavy rain, due to pilot error and other factors. Copilot and a passenger died, while the remaining 68 passengers and crew were injured.

★ On May 4 2007 Wizz Air Flight 441 on its approach to Warsaw Okecie Airport was reported by the airport manager as having flames shooting out of its engine number 2. Passengers and crew were evacuated from the aircraft with no casualties. After undergoing inspection, the aircraft was allowed to depart on its next scheduled flight.

See also

★ List of airports in Poland

References

1. Data from Poland's Office of Civil Aviation (''Urząd Lotnictwa Cywilnego''): [1]
2. Warsaw Airport's website, section: News, item: "New Terminal 2 will be opened in November" [3] (accessed 24 October 2006)

External links

★ Official website of the Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport

★