Cornwall Airport Newquay RAF St Mawgan | |||||||||||
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Summary | |||||||||||
Airport type | Public / Military / Commercial spaceport | ||||||||||
Owner | Cornwall Council | ||||||||||
Operator | Cornwall Airport Ltd. | ||||||||||
Serves | Newquay and Cornwall | ||||||||||
Location | Mawgan in Pydar, Cornwall | ||||||||||
Opened | 1962 | ||||||||||
Hub for | Eastern Airways | ||||||||||
Elevation AMSL | 390 ft / 119 m | ||||||||||
Coordinates | 50°26′27″N 004°59′43″W / 50.44083°N 4.99528°W | ||||||||||
Website | cornwallairportnewquay | ||||||||||
Map | |||||||||||
Runways | |||||||||||
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Statistics (2023) | |||||||||||
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Cornwall Airport Newquay (IATA: NQY, ICAO: EGHQ) is the main commercial airport for Cornwall, England located at Mawgan in Pydar, 4 NM (7.4 km; 4.6 mi) northeast of the town of Newquay on Cornwall's north coast. Its runway was operated by RAF St Mawgan before 2008, and is now owned by Cornwall Council and operated by Cornwall Airport Ltd.
The airport handled 461,300 passengers in 2017, a 24.2% increase over the previous year.[2] Newquay has a CAA Public Use Aerodrome Licence that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction. The Cornwall Air Ambulance is based at the airport. Since 2012, the airport has hosted the Aerohub enterprise zone. The 2,744 metre (9,003 ft) runway can take the largest and fastest of civil and military aircraft, having been built and maintained for decades as an RAF maritime operations base. The US Navy were present with the USN AWD storage facility and Joint Maritime Facility. With the end of the Cold War and changes in American political priorities, the Americans pulled out of all involvement with the base by the end of 2009. The last RAF flying squadron based at St Mawgan was 203(R) Squadron which moved out in 2008, while part of the site continues to be used by the RAF.[3]
The airport is also the location of Spaceport Cornwall. The facility has the capability to launch small space satellites into low Earth orbit using an air-launch-to-orbit type system.[4]