AN ABANDONED airport in Spain is set to reopen after 14 years.
Nicknamed Spain’s “ghost airport”, the vast airfield boasts one of Europe’s longest runways.
Ciudad Real International Airport will reopen in 2026, despite being abandoned for well over a decade.
Having stood largely empty for the past 14 years and used for long-term aircraft storage, it has now been revealed the airfield will be opening its doors again under a new owner, resuming passenger flights this year.
Managing director of Ciudad Real International Airport, Rafael Gómez Arribas, has said that the site will only operate private flights, mainly from Europe and the US.
Located 235km south of Madrid, the Spanish airport was initially set to be the country’s second largest airport and an alternative to Madrid’s Barajas airport.
Opening in 2008, the aviation site cost more than €1 billion to build, and included one of Europe’s longest runways.
Measuring 13,451 ft, the strip was constructed to accommodate the Airbus A380, the world’s biggest commercial aircraft.
Despite plans to be a commercial flight hub for around 2.5 million passengers a year, the site struggled financially, mainly down to its remote location miles away from Madrid.
The airport soon went bankrupt and closed just four years later in 2012, earning the nickname of Spain’s “ghost airport”.
In 2015, the abandoned airport was won in a bankruptcy auction by Tanzeen International for just €10,000.
It was eventually converted into a temporary storage facility during the pandemic, and held grounded planes from European airlines while flights were not operating.
After the closure of the airport in 2012, large yellow crosses were painted on the runway as a visual warning to planes flying overhead that the site was no longer operational and the runway was unsuitable for landing.