Coimbatore Airport is situated in Peelamedu, Coimbatore. The airport was initially known as Peelamedu or Coimbatore Civil Aerodrome. It is situated at a distance of 13 miles (21 kilometers) from the city centre. Very few international flights are operational from the airport. The Coimbatore Airport serves only 10 airlines. But in future, 13 additional airlines are planning to start their functions in the airport. The airport authority has plans to serve 24 airlines by the end 2009.
The Coimbatore Airport started operating as a civil aerodrome in 1940 with maiden flights by Indian Airlines, Fokker F27, Douglas DC-3 and Hawker Siddley`s Avro 748. Initially the airport functioned flights to Chennai and Mumbai. Afterwards Cochin and Bangalore were added. During the 80s the Airport was closed due to runway expansion to suit the modern days jets like Boeing 737 and Airbus. Indian Airlines commenced international services to Sharjah in 1995. In 2007, Asian airlines started operating to destinations like Colombo and Singapore. Silkair and SriLankan Airlines recently started operations to Coimbatore, linking Coimbatore with Singapore and Colombo. Currently there are four international airlines operating from the airport. These include Air Arabia, Air India-Express, SriLankan Airlines and Silkair.
The Coimbatore airport has a runway measuring 10,000 feet in length. After final expansion work, the length will improve to 12,500 ft. The airport authority has plans to rennovate and expand the airport premise. They are planing to construct a parallel taxiway in order to decrease the runway occupancy time and turnaround of aircrafts; increasing the number of parking bays to eight from the present six; modernising the present terminal with increased capacity, sliding doors, aerobridges with a visual docking guidance system, escalators, elevators and modern systems for baggage-handling. The Coimbatore Airport presently has one terminal and another one is under construction. Some International and Domestic flights flying to and from Coimbatore are-- Air Arabia - Sharjah; Air India IC - Sharjah; Silk Air - Singapore; SriLankan Airlines - Colombo and Air Deccan - Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Cochin, Hyderabad, Mumbai; Air India IC - Chennai, Cochin, Kozhikode, Mumbai, New Delhi; Jet Airways - Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai; JetLite - Bangalore, Mumbai, New Delhi; Kingfisher Airlines - Bangalore; Paramount Airways - Chennai, Hyderabad; SpiceJet - Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, New Delhi.
