José Torres, President of Lanzarote’s Chamber of Commerce, supported by The Cabildo and both Tias and San Bartolomé’s Ayuntamientos, recently asked Aena, the airport’s authority, to fast track their airport expansion plans, including the proposed runway extension.
Lanzarote’s runway is the smallest of all the international runways in The Canaries, at 2,400 Metres in length. The proposal is to extend it, to match the others, to 3,400 Metres. Although large aircraft can take off from here – we’ve seen 747’s doing so – they generally cannot do so with a full load of passengers and fuel, which means a refuelling stop en route to wherever they are headed. At maximum take off weight a 747 needs just over 3,000 metres to get airborne.
The chamber conducted a study into the project, and not surprisingly, it concluded that the extension should be out to sea, rather than trying to find a way to extend it into the industrial area of Playa Honda. read more »