Departure
96%
vs 95% ▲ 1
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
La Palma Airport serves the Canary Island of La Palma from a single runway carved into a narrow coastal strip near the island's mountainous terrain, 8 km south of the capital, Santa Cruz de La Palma. Operated by AENA, it handles a mix of inter-island, mainland Spanish and European charter and scheduled traffic, and is notable among sim pilots for its history of wind-related closures caused by downdrafts off the surrounding slopes.
La Palma Airport lies on the eastern coast of La Palma in the Canary Islands, an AENA-operated field handling scheduled and charter traffic between the island, mainland Spain and continental Europe. For a visiting VFR or IFR pilot it is an interesting destination because of its single long runway squeezed onto reclaimed coastal ground, its lack of a parallel taxiway, and its exposure to strong and sometimes dangerous mountain-wave winds that have periodically closed the airport altogether.
The airport sits in the municipalities of Breña Baja and Villa de Mazo, about 8 km (5 miles) south of Santa Cruz de La Palma, the island's capital, on the eastern side of La Palma in the Canary Islands. It is served by its own approach, tower and ground frequencies, indicating that arriving and departing traffic operates within controlled airspace under Canarias Approach.
The airport has a single physical runway, 18/36, aligned roughly north-south. It is 7,225 ft (about 2,200 m) long with a hard surface and is lit for night operations. There is no ILS installed.
Pilots should expect to work Canarias Approach on 126.1 MHz, with ATIS broadcast on 118.6 MHz. On the ground, Ground is on 121.8 MHz and Tower on 118.9 MHz. There is no ILS at the field.
The island's first airfield, Buenavista de Arriba, opened on 22 September 1955 about three kilometres west of Santa Cruz de La Palma at an elevation of 350 metres, with a roughly 1,000 metre runway surfaced in 1958 and used by Junkers Ju 52/3m and Douglas DC-3 aircraft; its old runway, control tower and terminal building (now a private house) still survive. Because Buenavista suffered from difficult wind and weather conditions, a new airport was built near Mazo, about eight kilometres south of Santa Cruz, opening on 15 April 1970. Rising traffic led to the runway being extended roughly 500 metres to the north, work completed on 1 April 1980, and the runway has remained unchanged since. The airport's exposed position continues to make it susceptible to dangerous westerly winds, with mountain-slope downdrafts occasionally forcing partial or complete closures; one of the most serious episodes, between 6 and 10 April 2008, saw about three quarters of scheduled flights cancelled and the airport temporarily shut entirely, diverting many charter flights to Tenerife South and leaving over 1,500 passengers to use ferries or remain on other islands. In 2021 the Cumbre Vieja volcanic eruption deposited ash on the airport grounds, forcing a further temporary shutdown of operations. A new terminal opened in July 2011 alongside a new control tower.
La Palma Airport is operated by AENA and today handles a mixture of inter-island flights, principally by Binter Canarias and CanaryFly to Gran Canaria, Lanzarote and Tenerife, alongside scheduled and seasonal charter services to mainland Spain and numerous European cities in Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and elsewhere. There is still no taxiway running parallel to the runway, so aircraft must back-track along the runway itself, which limits airport capacity to around ten movements per hour. The single runway remains unchanged since its 1980 extension, and the field has no instrument landing system.
