Departure
97%
vs 95% ▲ 2
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
Madeira International Airport Cristiano Ronaldo (LPMA/FNC) sits on a dramatic clifftop foreland east of Funchal, its single runway extended onto a pillar-supported platform to overcome the island's steep terrain. Renowned as one of the most challenging commercial airports in the world, it demands additional pilot training and offers a genuinely spectacular approach for anyone flying it in the simulator. The airport now bears the name of Madeiran-born footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, following a 2017 renaming that attracted its own share of controversy.
Madeira Airport lies on a narrow foreland jutting into the Atlantic on the northeastern side of Funchal, the capital of Portugal's Madeira archipelago. Operated by ANA Aeroportos de Portugal (part of the Vinci Group), it serves as the main gateway to the island, handling both leisure traffic from mainland Europe and vital cargo movements for the archipelago. Its combination of mountainous terrain, sea cliffs and a runway built partly on a bridge-like platform of supporting pillars makes it one of the most distinctive and demanding fields a simulator pilot can attempt, often compared to the old Kai Tak approach in Hong Kong for the skill its visual circling approach demands.
The airport is located in the civil parish of Santa Cruz, about 13.2 km (8.2 mi) east-northeast of Funchal, after which the field is often informally named. It occupies a foreland site with high ground and cliffs close to the runway 05 threshold, a geography that rules out a straight-in instrument approach from that direction and shapes all circling and visual procedures at the field.
The airport has a single physical runway, 05/23, some 8,630 to 8,633 ft (roughly 2,630 to 2,631 m) long with a hard surface and runway lighting on both directions. There is no ILS. The runway is a tabletop structure with steep drop-offs at each end: at the 05 end the ground falls away just short of a motorway that loops around the runway, while the 23 end drops from a platform carried on supporting pillars similar to a beam bridge, a construction that received the Outstanding Structure Award from the International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering in 2004.
Approach can be contacted on 119.2 MHz and the tower on 118.35 MHz.
Because high ground and cliffs lie beyond the runway 05 threshold, a direct ILS approach and landing from that direction is not available. Instead, arriving aircraft fly a visual approach that involves routing around the airport and completing a turn of roughly 180 degrees before lining up on a notably short final approach. The field is also known for frequent operational constraints caused by wind shear, and pilots flying here are expected to have undergone additional specific training for the airport's approach.
The airport's position on a foreland jutting out to sea, with Funchal to the southwest and the easternmost headland of Ponta de São Lourenço further along the coast, provides strong visual cues when inbound. The elevated, pillar-supported runway extension and the motorway curving around the runway 05 end are distinctive features useful for visually identifying the field on approach.
Madeira Airport opened officially on 8 July 1964 with a single 1,600 m (5,200 ft) runway then numbered 06/24; the first aircraft to land was a TAP Air Portugal Lockheed Constellation carrying 80 passengers. Rising tourist traffic through the 1970s prompted an extension to 1,800 m (5,900 ft), inaugurated on 1 February 1986 by Portuguese president António Ramalho Eanes, while a new terminal built in 1973 handled 500,000 passengers. Continued growth in demand led to a further, more radical extension: the runway heading was slightly adjusted and the designation changed to 05/23, with the new 2,781 m (9,124 ft) runway completed on 15 September 2000, following an engineering approach that saw the runway built on a bridge-like platform of supporting pillars rather than a wholly new alignment. A new terminal opened on 6 October 2002, marked by the landing of an Air Atlanta Icelandic Boeing 747-200. In 2016 the airport was renamed Madeira International Airport Cristiano Ronaldo in honour of the Madeiran-born footballer, with the rebranded terminal and a bust of Ronaldo unveiled on 29 March 2017; the bust drew widespread media ridicule, including a parody by Kate McKinnon on Saturday Night Live, and was later replaced. The airport's approach to the original runway 06 (now 05) led to comparisons with the former Kai Tak Airport in Hong Kong, and the History Channel programme Most Extreme Airports ranked it the ninth most dangerous airport in the world and third most dangerous in Europe.
Madeira Airport remains a busy international gateway, the fourth-busiest airport in Portugal, serving mainly European metropolitan destinations and functioning as the principal hub for cargo into and out of the archipelago. It is a focus city for TAP Air Portugal and an operating base for Ryanair. Given the demanding terrain and approach, additional pilot training is required to operate here, and simulator pilots attempting the field should be prepared for a visual circling approach rather than a straightforward instrument arrival.
