Valley International Airport

Valley International Airportcodes are IATA: HRL, ICAO: KHRL, FAA LID: HRL. The HRL airportis a public airport located in the Rio Grande Valley, in Cameron County, Texas, United States. Valley International Airport is the largest airport in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas. The airport is often called the "Gateway to South Padre Island."

Valley International Airport

General Information

Valley International Airportcodes are IATA: HRL, ICAO: KHRL, FAA LID: HRL. The HRL airportis a public airport located in the Rio Grande Valley, in Cameron County, Texas, United States. Valley International Airport is the largest airport in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas. The airport is often called the "Gateway to South Padre Island."

The Federal Aviation Administration categorized the airport as a primary commercial service airport for 2011-2015, according to the National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems.

History

During the Second World War, Harlingen’s Military Air Base used the airport field and building for pilot training. The Valley International airport’s commercial flight history starts in 1967 after the Hurricane Beulah flooded the Harlingen civil airport, and the service was turned to the VIA. The first jets at the airport were Trans-Texas Douglas DC-9-10s. From 1968, the jet flew nonstop flights to Houston Hobby Airport and Corpus Christi, also made direct flights to Dallas Love Field, Arkansas, Little Rock, and Memphis.

In 1975, Southwest Airlines started serving Harlingen, with Boeing 737-200s, in 1986 the airlines had seven nonstop flights to Houston, and two nonstop flights to San Antonio, one nonstop to Austin.

In the early 1980s, Mexicana de Aviacion flew nonstop direct flights to Mexico City and Monterrey.

Later Sun Country Airlines, Delta Air Lines, also started serving the airport.

Capacity

Valley International Airport is spanned on 2,428 acres, which is approximately 983 HA. At an elevation, the airport is on 36 feet. The airport has three asphalt runways. One of them is 8,301 feet long, the other one 7,257 feet in length, and the third one is 5,949 feet long.

According to the statistics of the Federal Aviation Administration, in the year 2011, the airport had 119 aircraft operations per day. At that time, there were 32 based aircraft at the airport, including 3% jet, 9% multi-engine, 88% single-engine. In 2012, at the Valley International Airport, there were 43 based aircraft.

Six airlines are operating at Valley International Airport: American Eagle, Delta Connection, Frontier Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Sun County Airlines, and United Express.