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Xichang Qingshan Airport (ZUXC/XIC) serves Xichang, seat of the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in southern Sichuan Province, China, and traces its origins back to a wartime airfield associated with the Flying Tigers. Sitting at a lofty 5,092 feet amid mountainous terrain, it offers a single long concrete runway equipped with ILS, making it a notable high-altitude destination for simulator pilots exploring southwestern China.
Xichang Qingshan Airport is a dual military/public aerodrome serving Xichang, the seat of the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province, China. Its high field elevation of 5,092 feet, long single runway and mountainous surroundings make it an engaging destination for VFR and instrument approaches alike in the simulator, and its history as a wartime staging point for Allied airpower in China adds character to any visit.
The airfield lies at Xichang in southwestern Sichuan, in the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, at coordinates 27.99 N, 102.183 E. It sits in mountainous terrain typical of this part of Sichuan, with the Anning River valley nearby; the modern airport site is at Guogailiang, now part of Anning Town, some distance from the original wartime airfield that lay closer to Xichang itself.
The airport has a single physical runway, 18/36, 11,816 feet long with a hard surface and runway lighting. An ILS is provided for runway 36, supporting instrument approaches into this high-elevation field.
Air traffic control is provided by Xichang Tower, callsign XICHANG TWR, on a frequency of 130 MHz. Runway 36 is served by an ILS for instrument approaches.
The airport's lineage stretches back to Xiaomiao Airport, a rudimentary airstrip built in 1932 on the Anning River Valley plain northwest of old Xichang County, at the foot of Tianwang Mountain, during the Sichuan warlord wars. Expanded in 1935 into an H-shaped pair of short runways, it saw its first real military use in 1936 when Yang Sen's 20th Army garrisoned Xichang. With the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Nationalist government progressively enlarged the field, and in 1938 a trial postal flight from Chongqing opened an air route that gave the airfield an important communications role. After Xikang Province was created in 1939, Chiang Kai-shek based his headquarters at Xichang and had the runway reinforced to 1,500 by 50 metres, with dispersal routes and dozens of camouflaged aircraft shelters so effective that Japanese bombing raids failed to find aircraft hidden within them. From August 1940 a US ground crew squadron of over 300 personnel was stationed there, and American transport aircraft used the field daily. In March 1943 the Flying Tigers, by then reorganised as the 14th Air Force, were ordered to Xiaomiao Airport with bombers, transports and ground crew, opening military air routes from Xichang to India, Chongqing and Kunming and making the field a vital, well-hidden link in China's wartime air network. By 1944 the airfield had a 1,560-metre gravel runway and hosted five to six hundred aircrew and ground personnel. Civil aviation began in 1946 when China National Aviation Corporation opened the Xichang-Chongqing route, and the field became a joint military-civilian airport with further routes to Kunming, Haikou and Taiwan. It was formally named Xichang Xiaomiao Airport in October 1950, though operations lapsed at the end of that year; the Chengdu-Xichang route reopened the station in 1958. In February 1967 the State Planning Commission approved construction of a new airport at Guogailiang, initially named Guogailiang Airport, with building work starting that April. By December 1974 the new field was essentially complete, with a 3,600-metre by 50-metre north-south runway, a parallel taxiway, six connecting taxiways and several aprons. Xichang Xiaomiao Airport closed on 1 May 1975 as operations transferred to the new Guogailiang site. Further expansion and renovation took place from 1988 to December 1989, and on 12 May 1997 the airport was renamed Xichang Qingshan Airport, the name it retains today.
Xichang Qingshan Airport continues to operate as a joint military/public airport handling scheduled airline services for Xichang and the surrounding Liangshan prefecture. An expansion project began in February 2010 to develop the field further. The single long, lit runway with ILS on runway 36 supports operations at this high-elevation mountain airport.
