Modern aviation is not only measured in knots or altitudes, but also in the ability of airports to process huge flows of people or cargo on a continuous basis. But there is an unwanted scenario that could occur: that the airport is not enough. When it collapses, it dies of success and serious logistical measures have to be taken. This is what happened in Istanbul: the need to expand the old Atatürk airport encountered an insurmountable barrier in the form of urban geography.
For great evils, great remedies: they had to move the entire airport while international aviation and the country’s logistics continued their course. The event is known as “The Great Move“and constitutes the largest move in civil aviation. In less than 45 hours the center of gravity of air transport in the region moved 42 kilometers north, to the new Istanbul Airport (IST), with all that this entails.
The move. In aviation, this operational transfer program is known as ORAT (Operational Readiness and Airport Transfer) and it goes without saying that this move was not spontaneous, but rather the opposite: it took two years of meticulous preparation in which they trained 33,000 airport staff and carried out two large-scale drills to detect potential problems.
It all started immediately after the opening of the new airport in October 2018 and the final phase (that move), was executed in a continuous 45-hour window between April 5 and 6, 2019 to move more than 10,000 pieces of equipment with a total weight of 47,300 tons. In fact, it was even better: they did it in much less time.
Why is it important. If a move has its ins and outs per se, for an airport the problems and the need to execute it without errors multiply as long as it is a living infrastructure with interdependent systems such as fuel, air traffic control, security, IT, passengers and luggage. Disconnecting, transporting and reconnecting everything without collapsing the air traffic of one of the busiest cities in the world is a high-flying engineering challenge.
“The Great Move” showed that a world-class hub is possible without a prolonged dual transition, minimizing the operational risk of managing two airports simultaneously. Finally, the movement consolidated Istanbul as a great connection point between Europe and Asia, rivaling others in the Middle East such as Doha or Dubai. Without this move, Turkish Airlines’ growth would likely have been stagnant due to the physical limitations of the old airport.
Context. In 2017, Atatürk Airport was the fifth busiest in Europe, behind Heathrow, Charles de Gaulle, Frankfurt and Amsterdam. Without going any further, in 2018 served to almost 70 million passengers, making it the tenth busiest on the planet. But it was limited: it was surrounded by the city on three sides and by the Sea of Marmara on the fourth, so expansion was physically impossible. The secondary airport of Sabiha Gökçen It had also reached its maximum capacity.
The lack of space was so critical that it prevented the Airbus A380 from operating, making Atatürk the only major airport in Europe and the Middle East unable to receive such aircraft. So in 2013 they made the decision. The flight that brought down the curtain on Atatürk was Turkish Airlines TK54: it took off on April 6, 2019 at 02:44 to Singapore.
In figures. Although there are slight variations in sources directly involved such as Turkish Airlines or the documentary he recorded of the process by the airport operator with the collaboration of National Geographic, are minor and do not detract from the colossal nature of the operation:
- A planned duration of 45 hours (which they reduced to 33 according to the IGA and less than 30 according to Turkish Airlines)
- More than 10,000 pieces of equipment moved between airports, with a total weight of 47,300 tons. Equivalent to 33 football fields.
- 686 semi-trailers used for transportation, according to the CEO of Turkish Airlines.
- 1,800 people were directly involved in the process.
- They estimated the distance traveled by the trucks in 45 hours to be 400,000 kilometers, that is, going around the Earth about 10 times.
How they did it. It took two years of meticulous preparation in which they trained 33,000 airport staff and conducted two large-scale drills to detect potential problems. Planning required more than 100 meetings and workshops and there were three logistics companies involved. For execution, they developed a logistical transfer plan with details of the movement of each vehicle in 15-minute windows. The route was established through a corridor between the two airports, using the new highway connection between both facilities and each vehicle was checked twice: once at the departure gate and once in a separate control area.
The whole process was monitored in real time with GPRS to detect any incident. At 02:59 on April 6, 2019, the IATA code changes were made: Atatürk’s IST code was renamed ISL and the new airport inherited it. Between 02:00 and 14:00 that day, both airports were closed to commercial flights, a 12-hour period that constituted the critical core of the entire operation.
The new airport. Istanbul Airport had an estimated budget of 22 billion euros, becoming at that time the second most expensive airport ever built, as told Reuters. Designed with a single terminal under a single roof of 1.4 million square meters, initially allowing 90 million passengers annually.
The master plan contemplates expansions up to 200 million, with independent runways that allow simultaneous landings and takeoffs, eliminating waiting in the air. In 2025, the airport rondo 85 million passengers, making it the second busiest in Europe after Heathrow and the seventh in the world.
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