The History of Stansted Airport

History of Stansted Airport.

Second World War

Unidentified B-26 Marauder of the 344th Bomb Group at Stansted, 1944.

The airfield opened in 1943 and was used during the Second World War RAF Stansted Mountfitchet was used by the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Force as a bomber airfield and as a major maintenance depot. Although the official name was Stansted Mountfitchet, the base was known as simply Stansted in both written and spoken form.

The station was first allocated to the USAAF Eighth Air Force in August 1942 as a heavy bomber airfield. As well as an operational bomber base, Stansted was also a ATSC maintenance and supply depot concerned with major overhauls and modification of B-26s. After D-Day these activities were transferred to France, but the base was still used as a supply storage area for the support of aircraft on the continent.

Postwar use

After the withdrawal of the Americans on 12 August 1945, Stansted was taken over by the Air Ministry and used by No. 263 Maintenance Unit, RAF for storage purposes. In addition, between March 1946 and August 1947, Stansted was used for housing German prisoners of war.

Avro York of the based Air Charter Ltd taking off on a trooping flight in 1955 with wartime hangars in the background

The Ministry of Civil Aviation finally took control of Stansted in 1949 and the airport was then used as a base by several UK charter airlines. The US military returned in 1954 to extend the runway for a possible transfer to NATO. The transfer to NATO was never realised, however, and the airport continued in civil use, ending up under BAA control in 1966.

During the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s the Fire Service Training School (FSTS) was based on the eastern side of the airfield under the auspices of the Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation, now the Civil Aviation Authority. The school was responsible for the training of all aviation fire crews for British airfields as well as those of many overseas countries.

Commercial operations

A Maxjet Boeing 767-200 arriving in the USA from London Stansted

Beginning in 1966, after Stansted was placed under BAA control, the airport was used by holiday charter operators wishing to escape the higher costs associated with operating from Heathrow and Gatwick. From the outset, however, BAA and the British government planned to develop Stansted into London's third airport, to relieve Heathrow and Gatwick of excess congestion in the future. The airport's first terminal building opened in 1969 and was expanded the next year to handle the growing number of passengers.

In 1984, the government approved a plan to develop Stansted in two phases, involving both airfield and terminal improvements that would increase the airport's capacity to 15 million passengers per year. Construction of the current terminal building began in 1988 and was completed in March 1991, and was designed by the internationally acclaimed Lord Foster. At the time it was the most modern airport complex in the world and cost £100 million.

Long-haul scheduled services commenced in the early 1990s when American Airlines operated a transatlantic service between Stansted and Chicago, however the route was unprofitable and was withdrawn in 1993. Continental Airlines also operated services in the late 1990s from Newark, but this service was stopped shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Long-haul services to the USA returned in late 2005, when Eos Airlines and MAXjet Airways commenced all-business-class services from Stansted to New York-JFK Airport. In 2006, MAXjet expanded their service with flights to Washington, D.C., Las Vegas and Los Angeles. American Airlines began daily flights to Stansted in October 2007 from New York-JFK and was originally expected to operate a second daily flight from April 2008. However, all three services to the USA have since been discontinued following the demise of MAXjet Airways in December 2007 and Eos Airlines in April 2008. Finally, in July 2008 American Airlines withdrew from the airport, spelling the end of Stansted transatlantic passenger operations.

Long haul transatlantic operations are to make a return to Stansted in June 2010, as Sun Country Airlines have announced a seasonal weekly service from Stansted to Minneapolis. The flight will make a re-fuelling stop-over in Gander, Newfoundland as the aircraft used for the flight, a Boeing 737-800, will not able to complete a non-stop westbound flight from Stansted to Minneapolis. The flights will operate from June 11 to August 15, 2010.

Stansted also had scheduled and charter flights to Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, but these flights to Canada have now ceased. Long-haul services to Asia commenced in March 2009 with Malaysian low-cost airline Air Asia X providing direct flights to Kuala Lumpur.

Since 1984 the airport's capacity had been limited to a maximum throughput of 25 million passengers per annum (25 mppa) in accordance with recommendations made by the 1984 public inquiry and confirmed by the government of the day.

A major expansion programme to the existing terminal took place between 2007 and 2009, adding nearly 5,900 square metres of floorspace to give space for additional baggage carousels, a new immigration and passport control hall and a hypostyle arrivals hall with improved facilities.

In November 2006 Uttlesford District Council rejected a BAA planning application to increase the permitted number of aircraft movements and to remove the limit on passenger numbers. BAA immediately appealed against the decision and a public inquiry opened lasting from May until October 2007. Planning Inspector Alan Boyland made his recommendations in January 2008. Those recommendations were largely followed by the Secretary of State for Transport (Geoff Hoon) and the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Hazel Blears), who jointly allowed the applicant's appeal in October 2008. A series of legal challenges by community campaign group Stop Stansted Expansion (SSE) were rejected by the High Court during 2009.

In 2008 57 people were arrested after Plane Stupid, the environmental activist group, broke through the barriers and created a 'stockade' on a taxiway which resulted in 52 flights being cancelled.

Incidents and accidents

Stansted has been designated by the UK Government as its preferred airport for any hijacked planes requesting to land in the UK. This is because its design allows a hijacked airliner to be isolated well away from any terminal buildings or runways, allowing the airport to continue to operate while negotiations are carried out, or even while an assault or rescue mission is undertaken. Staff at the airport receive special training for dealing with hijacks. For this reason Stansted has been involved in more hijack incidents than might be expected for an airport of its size.

• On 31 March 1998, a chartered Hawker Siddeley HS 748 (owned by Emerald Airways), carrying the Leeds United football team, suffered an engine explosion on take off, resulting in an emergency landing and evacuation. All onboard survived, with only a few suffering minor injuries.

• On 22 December 1999, Korean Air Cargo Flight 8509, a Boeing 747, crashed shortly after take off from the airfield due to pilot error. The only people onboard at the time were the aircrew and all four were killed. The aircraft crashed in Hatfield Forest near the village of Great Hallingbury.

• On 6 February 2000, an Ariana Afghan Airlines Boeing 727 with 156 people on board was hijacked and flown to Stansted Airport. After a four-day stand-off the hostages on board were safely freed and the incident ended peacefully. It later emerged that the motive behind the hijack was to gain asylum in the UK, sparking debate about immigration into the country. A large number of passengers on board the plane also applied for asylum. In July 2004, it was reported that a number of hijackers had won their bid for asylum in the UK, their convictions for hijacking having been quashed for misdirection of the jury in 2003.

• On 27 February 2002, a Ryanair Boeing 737-800 aircraft operating Ryanair Flight 296 from Dublin to Stansted was evacuated shortly after landing when ground staff observed smoke from one of the engines. Subsequent investigations found that the likely cause of the incident was smoking oil from a broken bearing as there was no sign of fire damage. Although the aircraft was fully evacuated within 90 seconds, the air crew struggled to open the emergency doors, and The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch recommended changes to training procedures for air-crew to allow better handling of similar situations in future.

Royal Air Force Station Stansted Mountfitchet
Near Stansted Mountfitchet, Essex, England
Shown within Essex
Type	Airfield
Coordinates	51° 53′ 6″ N, 0° 14′ 6″ E Coordinates: 51°53′06″N 000°14′06″E / 51.885°N 0.235°E / 51.885; 0.235
Location code	KT
Built	1943
In use	1943–1958
Occupants	United States Army Air Force Royal Air Force
Battles/wars	Second World War