Prestwick International

Glasgow Prestwick Airport
IATA: PIK ICAO: EGPK
Summary
Airport type	Public
Owner	Scottish Government
Operator	Prestwick Aviation Holdings Ltd
Serves	Glasgow, Prestwick, Strathclyde, Scotland
Location	Prestwick, South Ayrshire
Elevation AMSL	65 ft / 20 m
Coordinates	55°30′34″N 004°35′40″W / 55.50944°N 4.59444°W / 55.50944; -4.59444Coordinates: 55°30′34″N 004°35′40″W / 55.50944°N 4.59444°W / 55.50944; -4.59444
Website	glasgowprestwick.com
Map
EGPK Location in South Ayrshire
Runways
Direction Length Surface m ft 12/30 2,986 9,797 Concrete/Asphalt 03/21 1,905 6,250 Asphalt
Statistics (2016)
Passengers 673,232 Passenger change 15-16 10.2% Aircraft movements 25,714 Movements change 14-15 13.0%
Sources: UK AIP at NATS Statistics from the UK Civil Aviation Authority

Passengers	673,232
Passenger change 15-16	10.2%
Aircraft movements	25,714
Movements change 14-15	13.0%

Glasgow Prestwick Airport is an international airport serving the West of Scotland, situated 1 nautical mile (1.9 km; 1.2 mi) northeast of the town of Prestwick in South Ayrshire and 32 mi (51 km) from the city centre of Glasgow. It is the less busy of the two airports serving the area, with the busier being Glasgow Airport which is situated within the Greater Glasgow conurbation itself (located in the town of Paisley in Renfrewshire). It could become the European hub for commercial space flights and is Scotland's main candidate for development as the first UK Spaceport in competition with two sites south of the border, Cornwall Airport Newquay and Llanbedr Airport in Gwynedd. An announcement about which candidate will be officially licensed to go ahead is expected in the summer of 2017.

Glasgow Prestwick is Scotland's fifth busiest airport in terms of passenger traffic, after Edinburgh Airport, Glasgow Airport, Aberdeen Airport, and Inverness Airport, although it is the largest in terms of land area. Passenger traffic peaked at 2.4 million in 2007 following a decade of rapid growth, driven in part by the boom in no-frills airlines, particularly Ryanair which uses the airport as an operating base. In recent years, passenger traffic has declined; around 670,000 passengers passed through the airport in 2016.

The airport began life around 1934 primarily as a training airfield. A hangar, offices, and a control tower were constructed by the end of 1935. The airport's original owner was David Fowler McIntyre, also the owner of Scottish Aviation, with backing from the Duke of Hamilton. MacIntyre and Hamilton were the first aviators to fly over Mount Everest in 1933.