Kerry
Airport
Kerry Airport (IATA: KIR, ICAO: EIKY),
or Aerphort Chiarraí in Irish, often called Farranfore
Airport, is an airport in County Kerry, Republic of
Ireland. It is 15 minutes from Killarney and the Ring
of Kerry, and 20 minutes from Tralee. It is just over
one hour from both Cork and Limerick cities using the
newly constructed bypass roads. It is the only airport
in the Republic of Ireland to be within walking distance
of a train station, with Iarnród Éireann's
Farranfore station half a kilometre away. A new airport
bus terminal opened in January 2006 which has hourly
bus service to Cork, Limerick, Tralee and Killarney.
Over two million passengers have traveled through Kerry
Airport since its first scheduled flight in 1989. Aer
Arann and Ryanair are the scheduled airlines operating
from the airport.
The first aircraft to land at Kerry
was flown by Captain Milo Carr of the Department of
Transport and Power (now the Department of Transport
and the Marine on 25 August 1969. The first scheduled
flight from Kerry Airport was on 22 May 1989 to Dublin
by Aer Lingus, followed the next day by Ryanair to London
Luton. The first large passenger jet to use the new
facility was a Boeing 757. The first transatlantic charter
flight was operated by American Trans Air (now ATA Airlines
from New York City).
The airport is a public limited company
(PLC) but not quoted on any stock exchange. It had a
profit of €385,000 in 2004 on a turnover of €6.4
million. The main shareholders in Kerry Airport are
the Kerry Group, bin Mahfouz family, Kerry County Council,
Electricity Supply Board (ESB) and Denis Kelleher.
Kerry Airport employs 49 people and
is reported to offer some of the lowest costs to airlines
in Europe. In 2006 there were 185,000 passengers.
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