HISTORY
Don Mueang is an international airport serving Bangkok and Thailand. It is officially opened on 1914. It is the first international airport in Bangkok, second one is Suvarnabhumi airport. At first the Don Mueang was spelled as Don Muang and the airport code is BKK. Now after the opening of second airport of Suvarnabhumi for commercial flights the name was changed to Don Mueang and its airport code is DMK. The ICAO code which is used for air traffic control and air traffic operations is still VTBD. On September 27- 28 2006 this airport was closed. Due to the improvement of taxiway transport facility to suvarnabhumi work the airport was reopened temporarily on January 30 2007 but some of the domestic flights were started from this airport on march 25 2007. Because of the floods in Bangkok in 2011 the airport was flooded with water and closed.
On March 2012 government ordered for reopening of Don Mueang airport and from September 2012 it was reopened. The reason for the reopening of airport is to take off the pressure of suvarnabhumi airport which was designed for 45 million passengers but handled 47.5 million passengers last year and according to government estimation the number of passengers in 2012 was around 51 million which creates inconvenience to passengers. Around 10 airlines are proposed to start services through this airport.
INFORMATION
The airport has 2 runaways Runway 21 R/03L and Runway 21 R/03R. Runway 21 R/03L is 3700 meters long, 60 meters wide and Runway 21 R/03R is 3500 meters long, 45 meters wide. The capacity of airport is 60 flights per hour. Now, this airport serves the chattered and domestic flights by Royal Thai air force. The airport has less blitz and nice as suvarnabhumi. It has 95 Aircraft Parking stands and263 check-in counters. It is an airport through which an airline routes most of the traffic for budget and domestic flights. Air Asia, Nok Air, Orient Thai, Solar Air, PC Air are the airline services fly through this airport.
TRANSPORT
The quickest and easiest way to reach this airport is Taxi which is around 24 km from the centre of the town. However we have transport facilities by train and bus also. The taxi fare will be meter plus 50 baht airport surcharge excluding toll way fee. Passengers have to pay the toll way fee. Transport by bus is the cheapest way which costs around 20 baht but the room for luggage in bus will be small. Transport by train incurs train for every one hour and journey will be another one hour since it is on the main line to chiang mai. The distance from Don Mueang airport to Suvarnabhumi airport is around 24 km. Most of the people prefer taxi for transport even though there is bus facility.
DEPOT
Don Mueang Airport has 3 depots and depot 2 is currently not working. The terminal 1 is for international depot and terminal 3 is for domestic depot. The airport has 2 levels. Arrival hall is on the first floor. Check-in counters of all airlines and departure hall is located on second floor. The second floor we find money exchange counters, restaurants, gift shops and in first floor we have fast food outlets, medical service, airport transfer service and shopping plaza.
