Departure
97%
vs 95% ▲ 2
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
Florø Airport is a small regional airport on the island of Florelandet, serving the town of Florø in Kinn Municipality, Vestland, on Norway's west coast. Operated by the state-owned Avinor, it is a single-runway field notable as a base for North Sea helicopter operations and a Royal Norwegian Air Force search-and-rescue detachment, making it an interesting stop for a VFR pilot exploring the fjord coast.
Florø Airport is a regional aerodrome situated on the southern shore of the island of Florelandet, immediately adjacent to the town centre of Florø, in Kinn Municipality, Vestland county. It is owned and operated by Avinor, the state airport operator, and combines fixed-wing airline services with significant helicopter activity supporting the North Sea oil industry and search-and-rescue operations, giving it a distinctive character for a field of its size.
The airport lies on Florelandet island on Norway's west coast, adjacent to the Florø town centre, in Kinn Municipality, Vestland county. It sits within the network of regional airports along the Norwegian coast that were developed from the late 1960s onward.
Florø has a single physical runway, 07/25, of 3,928 ft (approximately 1,197 m) with a hard surface and runway lighting. There is no ILS approach available.
Florø operates with an AFIS (Aerodrome Flight Information Service) rather than full air traffic control, on a frequency of 119.2 MHz. There is no ILS or other precision instrument approach at the field.
Air services to Florø date back to 1935, when Norwegian Air Lines operated seaplane routes along the west coast, calling at Florø on demand and landing at the docks at Florevika, with a boat used to ferry passengers out to the aircraft. From 1951 to 1959 an aeradio station, Florø Radio, operated at Rognaldsvåg to assist coastal air navigation. Plans for a land airport at Florø were first advanced in the 1950s by engineer Arne Bengtsen, envisaging a combined land and water aerodrome using the Scottish Aviation Twin Pioneer, and a government commission approved the scheme in 1956. Construction of a 400-metre runway began that year, but was abandoned once it became clear the Twin Pioneer could not be certified for winter operations; part of the unfinished runway was later used to build a local street. A further government commission in the early 1960s recommended a network of short-runway STOLports to serve smaller Norwegian communities, and Florø was included in the second phase of this programme. The airport opened on 1 July 1971 with an 820 by 30 metre runway and a small apron, as one of four regional airports commissioned that year alongside Førde, Sogndal and Ørsta-Volda. Widerøe was awarded the routes and initially flew de Havilland Canada Twin Otters, later introducing the Dash 7 on services to Oslo in 1983 and replacing its fleet with the Dash 8 in the early 1990s. A heliport was added in 1994, and the runway was extended from its original length in 2000. Coast Air and later Danish Air Transport operated the routes at various points before Widerøe resumed services in 2012, and a search-and-rescue helicopter base was established at the airport in 2009.
Florø Airport is served by Widerøe with flights to Bergen and by Danish Air Transport to Oslo. Bristow Helicopters operates flights from Florø out to North Sea oil platforms at Snorre, Visund, Gjøa and Knarr, and CHC Helikopter Service flies an AS332 Super Puma search-and-rescue helicopter from the airport on behalf of the Royal Norwegian Air Force's 330 Squadron. In 2014 the airport recorded over 200,000 passengers, making it the busiest regional airport in Norway that year.
