Departure
96%
vs 95% ▲ 1
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport lies five miles north of downtown Lubbock in the Texas South Plains, and is the primary commercial airport for the region as well as a feeder hub for FedEx and UPS. Its long concrete runways, control tower and Class C airspace make it a straightforward but busy destination for visiting pilots, with a history stretching back to a 1937 civil field and wartime service as a glider-training base.
Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport serves the city of Lubbock and the surrounding South Plains of West Texas. It is owned by the City of Lubbock and handles scheduled airline traffic alongside general aviation, with a secondary role as a feeder hub for FedEx and UPS turboprop operations. For a simulator pilot it offers a substantial three-runway layout, full ILS approaches, and the operational flavour of a controlled, Class C airport set amid flat, wide-open plains terrain.
The airport sits within Class C airspace, five miles north of the city of Lubbock in Lubbock County, Texas. It lies under the jurisdiction of Fort Worth Air Route Traffic Control Center for en-route services, with approach and departure control provided locally.
Lubbock Preston Smith has three physical runway pairs. The main runway, 17R/35L, is 11,498 feet long, hard-surfaced and lit, with an ILS serving Runway 17R. The second runway, 08/26, is 7,981 feet long, hard-surfaced and lit, with an ILS serving Runway 26. A shorter crosswind runway, 17L/35R, is hard-surfaced with declared lengths of 3,020 feet on 17L and 2,882 feet on 35R.
Lubbock Approach and Departure both operate on 119.2 MHz, with the tower on 120.5 MHz and ground control on 121.9 MHz. The ATIS broadcasts on 125.3 MHz, and a further frequency, 125.8 MHz, is listed for clearance delivery. UNICOM is available on 122.95 MHz, and a remote radio outlet for Fort Worth Radio (flight service) operates on 122.55 MHz. Runway 17R and Runway 26 are both equipped with ILS approaches.
As a Class C, tower-controlled airport, arriving and departing traffic is sequenced by Lubbock Tower and Approach/Departure control rather than by an informal circuit pattern; pilots should expect to follow ATC instructions for joining, sequencing and departure routings.
The airfield opened in November 1937 as South Plains Airport. In 1942 the US Army Air Forces requisitioned it for wartime training, rapidly building three concrete runways, taxiways, a large apron, hangars and a control tower, and it was renamed South Plains Army Airfield. Activated on 11 September 1942 as the South Plains Flying School, its mission was ground and flight training of glider pilots, conducted by the 848th School Squadron (Special) under the 64th Two-Engine Flying Training Group of the 80th Flying Training Wing, using Douglas C-47 Skytrains and Waco CG-4A gliders. Pilots trained here went on to fly gliders in combat during the Normandy invasion, Operation Market-Garden and Operation Varsity. Glider instruction ended in late 1944, after which the field became a maintenance and supply depot under Air Service Command, and later a storage site for excess aircraft awaiting reclamation. Military use ended on 1 December 1947, when the airfield was returned to local civil control. A civilian terminal built on the southwest corner of the field served commercial airlines through the 1950s and 1960s; the current terminal opened around 1976, and the original terminal building now houses the Silent Wings Museum, dedicated to World War II glider pilots. Braniff, Continental and Pioneer Air Lines all began scheduled service to Lubbock by 1945, with jet airline service arriving in 1965 and 1966. The airport was renamed Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport in 2004 in honour of former Texas governor and Texas Tech alumnus Preston E. Smith. Notable incidents include the 1962 wheels-up landing of a Continental Airlines Vickers Viscount after propeller strike damage on takeoff, and the fatal crash of Empire Airlines Flight 8284, a FedEx-contracted ATR 42, on landing in the early hours of 27 January 2009.
Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport continues to operate as a small hub commercial airport and serves as a feeder base for FedEx and UPS turboprop operations across the South Plains region. It remains a controlled, Class C field equipped with ILS approaches to two of its three runway pairs, supporting a mix of airline, cargo and general aviation traffic.
