Hamburg Finkenwerder Airport
Hamburg Finkenwerder Airport Flugplatz Hamburg-Finkenwerder | |||||||||||
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XFW | |||||||||||
Summary | |||||||||||
Airport type | Private | ||||||||||
Serves | Airbus' Hamburg facility | ||||||||||
Location | Hamburg, Germany | ||||||||||
Elevation AMSL | 23 ft / 7 m | ||||||||||
Coordinates | 53°32′09″N 09°50′13″E / 53.53583°N 9.83694°E | ||||||||||
Runways | |||||||||||
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Hamburg Finkenwerder Airport (IATA: XFW, ICAO: EDHI) is a private airport in the quarter of Finkenwerder, in the southwest part of Hamburg, Germany. It is part of the Hamburg plant of Airbus and is exclusively used by them for corporate, freight, test and delivery flights. Finkenwerder is fully able to handle the Airbus A380. It should not be confused with Hamburg Fuhlsbüttel Airport, the city's commercial public airport.
History
The airfield was built about 10 years after World War II, originally as a factory airfield. In 1964 the third prototype of the Transall C-160 made its first flight from the airport.
Beginning in April 2006, the runway was extended from 2,684 m to 3,183 m at the southern end, in order to accommodate the planned freight version of the Airbus A380. On 16 July 2007, the extended runway was handed over after completion of works to Airbus, around two months ahead of schedule.[1]
Airbus plant
The airport is part of the Airbus facility in Hamburg ("Airbus Operations GmbH"), where around 15,000 people are employed. Final assembly for all models of the A320 family takes place here, and both the A320 and A380 are fitted with their cabin interiors and painted for final delivery. In addition, final acceptance and delivery of A380s for customers in Europe and the Middle East takes place in Hamburg.[2]
The Hamburg factory is also home to Airbus’ A380 major component assembly hall, which houses the structural assembly and the fitting-with equipment of the forward and complete rear fuselage sections. These sections are then shipped to France on a specially built ferry, for final assembly in Toulouse.
A large spares centre is also maintained at Hamburg (which holds some 120,000 proprietary parts for customers from around the world), and A320 Family maintenance training facilities can also be found on-site. Hamburg also plays a key role in the A330 and A350 XWB programmes, for which it manufactures and equips the forward and rear fuselage sections.
Airlines and destinations
There are no public flights to and from the airport. Besides transfer, freight and test flights for Airbus there is a twice daily corporate shuttle service from here to Airbus' plant in Toulouse. The airport handles around 10 to 15 aircraft movements per day.
Airlines | Destinations |
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Germania | Corporate charter: Toulouse |
Incidents and accidents
- In 1967 the pilot of a Spantax Convair 990 Coronado mistook the 1360 m long runway of Finkenwerder for the 3000 m long runway of Hamburg Airport in Fuhlsbüttel, and only just brought the aircraft to a stop before the end of the runway.
See also
References
- ↑ ReGe Hamburg Projekt-Realisierungsgesellschaft: Start- und Landebahn an Airbus übergeben In German, 15 January 2014.
- ↑ "Airbus in Germany" Airbus, 15 January 2014.
External links
Media related to Hamburg Finkenwerder Airport at Wikimedia Commons
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