Kaliningrad Airport is the most western air gate of the Russian Federation. It takes many flights from other cities of our country. After all, traveling by air to this enclave means avoiding a lot of trouble with a passport, visa and crossing the border. In principle, the airport already has international status; planes from the CIS countries land on it . But soon a hub for passengers traveling to Western Europe should be built here . Kaliningrad Airport has a very interesting history. She, as well as other significant and useful facts about this air terminal, we will describe in this article.
Unique Devau Airport
When Kaliningrad was still called Königsberg and belonged to Germany, it also had its own civilian terminal. It is noteworthy that earlier, during the First World War, there were many military air bases, but for ordinary passengers the path to the sky was quite thorny. Germany is one of the countries that decided to allow civilians to travel by air. And the state did not build its first airport, called Devau, somewhere in Berlin, but in Königsberg. It happened back in 1919. In 1921, the world's first stationary aeronautical meteorological service was opened here for aircraft maintenance. But this is not all the interesting facts about Devau. The country of the Soviets, for a long time in international isolation, sent its first civilian flight here. In 1922, a plane landed in Devau, making a successful flight Moscow - Riga - Königsberg. After the liberation of the city from the Nazi invaders and the transfer of the enclave to the Soviet Union under the Potsdam Treaty, they began to build a new airport in Kaliningrad. But Devau did not become abandoned. Now there is an aviation museum and the base of the local flying club DOSAAF is located.
Location
It was decided to build a new civilian airport in the northeast of the city, since most flights were supposed to be taken from Moscow. The choice fell on the village of Khrabrovo, which is located at a distance of about twenty kilometers from the city center. All property that could be transported from Devau was transported to a new location. Until 1961, Kaliningrad Airport was still operated as the military base of the combined aviation squadron. In 1977, the landing strip began to receive TU-134 civilian aircraft. And only in 1979 a terminal was built for passengers. In 1988, the runway was reconstructed so that it was able to receive heavy liners of the TU-154 type. Asphalt paving turned out to be very useful, because the Boeing era has arrived. Now the westernmost gates of Russia are capable of accepting heavy liners weighing more than a hundred tons. Giants such as the Boeing 737.
Infrastructure
The current airport building began to be built in 2004, and completed in 2007. Thus, the civilian terminal meets all modern requirements for passenger service. The building is two-story, but getting lost in it is simply unrealistic. Firstly, room schemes hang everywhere. Kaliningrad airport information desk will inform you about arrivals and departures. Waiting for your flight will not be boring. For those who travel outside the country, there is a duty-free shop. The building has a special smoking area, which is surprising for airports. Foreign guests can pass the time in a special waiting room.
Passage of aviation control
Kaliningrad region is an enclave. Therefore, all passengers arriving here pass through the passport control. But it is enough for citizens of the Russian Federation to present an internal document. If you are planning to go further west, that is, have arrived in transit, you need a passport. For the safety of passengers and aircraft during boarding a flight you need to pass control. Check-in takes place depending on the airline. Since the city is twenty kilometers from the hub, it is worth arriving at Kaliningrad airport in advance. How to get to your reception - you will find out on the scoreboard in front of the entrance.
Where do the planes come from?
Numerous flights are bravely connected with other airports in Russia. From the capital here fly from Vnukovo, Sheremetyevo and Domodedovo. Kaliningrad is also connected to St. Petersburg, Murmansk, Cherepovets, Krasnodar, Kazan and Belgorod. From neighboring countries , planes fly to Kiev, Tashkent, Minsk, Bishkek and Riga from here. Irregular charter flights to Copenhagen (Scandinavien Airlines) and Berlin depart to Western Europe from Khrabrov. But in the future it is supposed to open new directions. Now Khrabrovo has a capacity of three million passengers per year. But in order to become a full-fledged international terminal, it needs to improve its infrastructure, in particular, transport links. So far, only the Kaliningrad-Airport bus number 144 and minibuses run. The fare is about 50 rubles.
Message Kaliningrad - airport
You can get to the city, of course, by taxi. This is the fastest way, but it costs between 250 rubles during the day and 400 rubles at night. Buses run every forty minutes. With a rented car, the city center is easily accessible by the Primorsky Ring motorway (travel time is about fifteen minutes). In the future, it is planned to launch a railway express train from the Kaliningrad station to the airport, especially since the Zelenogorsk - Svetlogorsk - Kaliningrad railway line has already been laid to Khrabrov. There are plans to build a hotel complex at the airport.