Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport 杭州萧山国际机场 Hángzhōu Xiāoshān Guójì Jīchǎng
IATA: HGH – ICAO: ZSHC
Summary
Airport type		Public
Operator		Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport Co. Ltd.
Location		Hangzhou
Elevation AMSL		23 ft / 7 m
Coordinates		30°13′46″N 120°26′04″E / 30.22944°N 120.43444°E / 30.22944; 120.43444Coordinates: 30°13′46″N 120°26′04″E / 30.22944°N 120.43444°E / 30.22944; 120.43444
Runways
Direction	Length		Surface
	ft	m
07/25	11,811	3,600	Concrete

Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport (IATA: HGH, ICAO: ZSHC) (simplified Chinese: 杭州萧山国际机场; pinyin: Hángzhōu Xiāoshān Guójì Jīchǎng) is the principal airport serving Hangzhou, a major city in the Yangtze River Delta region of the People's Republic of China and the provincial capital of Zhejiang.

The airport is built on the southern shore of Qiantang River in the Xiaoshan district and is 27 km away from downtown Hangzhou.

In 2009, Hangzhou airport handled 14,944,716 passengers and became the 9th busiest airport in China. In addition, the airport was the country's 8th busiest airport in terms of cargo traffic and the 10th busiest airport by traffic movements.

History

The airport was planned to be constructed in three phases. The first phase of construction started in July 1997, and was completed and opened for traffic on December 30, 2000. It replaces the old Hangzhou airport, which was a shared civil and military airfield. In September 2003, the central government of China declared HGH an international airport and, in March 2004, the airport officially became an international airport after immigration and customs facilities were built and put into service.

The airport was a hub of CNAC Zhejiang. After the airlines' merger with Air China, the latter inherited the Hangzhou hub.

UFO appearance

On the evening of 9 July 2010, the airport was shut down for an hour when an unidentified flying object was detected.

Air traffic control could not locate it on radar and prudently waved off landing flights. Eighteen flights were affected. Though normal operations resumed four hours later, the incident captured the attention of the Chinese media and sparked a firestorm of speculation on the UFO's identity.

The last famous case of a "UFO" closing an airport that was later linked to a Russian space launch occurred in Barnaul, Siberia in 2001.

Facilities

Phase One of the airport occupies 7,260 acres of land. It has a capacity of eight million passengers and 110,000 tons of cargo a year, and can handle aircraft as large as the Boeing 747-400. It has one runway of 3,600m in length and 45m in width. The passenger terminal can handle 3,600 passengers an hour and is 100,000 square metres in size (including an underground parking of 22,000 square metres). The departure level has 36 ticket counters, including 12 in the international side of the terminal. There are 2,900 seats in the departure lounge. The immigration and customs area occupies 9,500 sq. metre of terminal space.

The apron occupies 340,000 square metres of land, and there are 12 jetways and 18 departure gates.

Maintenance facilities are certified to perform B-Check on all types of aircraft and C-Check on Boeing 737 and Boeing 757 aircraft.

Transportation

The Shanghai-Hangzhou-Ningbo Expressway has an exit at the airport.

There are airport buses to downtown Hangzhou and Xiaoshan as well as to prefectures further away such as Yiwu.

Airlines and destinations

The following airlines serve Hangzhou as of July, 2010:

Passenger

Cargo Carriers

The content above was published at Airports-Worldwide.com in 2010.
We don't guarantee the information is fresh and accurate. The data may be wrong or outdated.
For more up-to-date information please refer to other sources.