| Busiest Airport in the World |
Which Airport is the world's biggest? And the busiest?
The Biggest Airport in the World
Taken literally as the airport which takes up the most land mass, thisis the King Fahd International Airport in Damman, Saudi Arabia. It takesup some 780 square kilometres - an area larger than many cities.
By comparison, London Heathrow takes up around 3,000 acres, or just 4.7 square miles.
The Busiest Airport in the World
This depends on whether you monitor aircraft movements (the numbers oftake-offs and landings), or passenger numbers. An airport such as WashingtonNational may have relatively high aircraft movements, but as the largestaircraft it handles is a Boeing 757, it handles relatively fewer annualpassengers than other airports with similar movements.
Movements and passenger numbers are both acceptable methods of determiningthe "busiest" airport, although passenger numbers is the generallyquoted figure.Most Passenger numbers
Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson is thebusiest airport in the world, handling 76.7 million passengers in 2002.Atlanta overtook Chicago O'Hare in 1998, and is now significantly ahead. Chicago handled 66.6 millionpassengers in 2002.
Busiest International Airport
London Heathrow handles the most international passengers (as opposedto passengers on domestic flights, which make up the majority of trafficat US airports). On an overall scale, Heathrow ranks third behind Atlantaand Chicago.
Busiest City (all airports)
When the flights from all airports in a city are combined, London is by farthe busiest aviation centre in the world.
Only London, Tokyo and NewYork have two airports in the top 30 worldwide.
Combining New York's JFK (30 Million) and Newark (29 Million) still does not reach the same level as London Heathrow.Despite being the major international gateway for Japan, Tokyo Narita (29 Million) is overshadowed by the mainly domestic Haneda (61 Million).This puts Tokyo on a relatively even keel with Heathrow (63 Million) and Gatwick (30 Million).
When Stansted (19 Million), Luton (6.5 Million), and London City (1.5 Million) are added on top, London handles a total of almost 120 million passengersannually.
Source: World airportsCouncil , BAA, Luton Airport, London City Airport