Transform Your Flight Sim Experience
with In-Depth Tracking & Analysis
Track every flight, analyse your performance,
and master your flying skills with My FS Flights
Get 10 flights free every month!
Tracked and analysed flights over miles
Stornoway Airport lies on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, some two miles east of the town it serves, and is the principal air gateway to the Western Isles. Operated by Highlands and Islands Airports Limited, it combines scheduled domestic services with a long military heritage and continues to host search and rescue helicopters, mail flights and occasional large-jet training.
Stornoway Airport (ICAO EGPO, IATA SYY) serves the town of Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides and is owned and operated by Highlands and Islands Airports Limited (HIAL), a company controlled by the Scottish Government. For a visiting pilot it offers a substantial hard runway with ILS approach in an otherwise remote and often weather-affected part of Scotland, and its mixed history as a wartime and Cold War military base gives it added interest beyond its current role as a domestic and lifeline air link for the islands.
The airfield sits on the Isle of Lewis, about two miles east of Stornoway town centre, within the Outer Hebrides archipelago. It is a controlled aerodrome, with approach, tower and AFIS services provided on the frequencies listed below; pilots planning a VFR flight should expect to operate within its associated airspace and to establish contact before entering the vicinity.
Stornoway has two paired hard runways, both lit. The main runway, 18/36, is around 7,230 ft long and is equipped with ILS. The secondary runway, 06/24, is a shorter hard, lit strip of around 3,290 to 3,595 ft. Field elevation is 16 ft.
Radio services at Stornoway are provided on 119.48 MHz, covering AFIS, Approach and Tower functions, with an ATIS broadcast on 115.1 MHz. The main runway, 18/36, is served by an ILS, supporting instrument approaches into the airfield.
The airfield opened in 1937 and was used mainly for military purposes from the outset. The Royal Air Force operated RAF Stornoway from the site during the Second World War, and again from 1972 until 1998, when it served as a NATO forward operating base. During the Cold War, from 1960 to 1983, it was home to 112 Signals Unit Stornoway (RAF), and NATO aircraft used the airfield for North Atlantic missions and as a stopover en route to Greenland and the United States. On 8 December 1983 a Cessna Citation I (registration G-UESS) crashed into the sea on approach to Stornoway, killing all ten passengers and crew.
Stornoway is now used mainly for domestic passenger services, with Loganair operating scheduled flights to Edinburgh, Glasgow, Inverness, Manchester and Southampton, and Hebridean Air Services flying to Benbecula. Royal Mail operates a daily mail flight from the airport, and Bristow Helicopters base search and rescue helicopters there on behalf of His Majesty's Coastguard. A number of privately owned light aircraft are based at the field, and the airfield has also been used for cross-wind training of large jets, including the Airbus A350.
