How is the airport defined today as “the most unnecessary in the world”?

In 2017, the British media defined the airport on the island of Saint Helena as most useless in the world. It was termed this way due to the small number of inhabitants of the place, the millions who spent to make it and all the problems associated with its construction.

To try to understand the English newspapers, you can start by mentioning that Saint Helena is a small island that belongs to the British Overseas Territory where they live. 4500 people. It is only 121 square kilometers in area and is located in a remote location: it is in the South Atlantic 1,900 kilometers from the African coast and 3,500 from the American coast.

The airport started to be built in 2012 and was only opened in 2016. They did it with $ 320 million issued by the UK government. Because the place where the track was created is small, mountainous and windy, the project suffered countless delays.

At first they didn’t see it as profitable – hence the headlines – despite government grants, but in October 2017, the company Air link started making weekly flights that departed from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Saint Helena.

The change was significant: it took five days by boat to get from South Africa to the island and the plane allowed flights of only five hours.

The first commercial flight to land in Santa Elena took place on October 14, 2017. An SA Airlink plane arrived at the airport and made an indelible mark on the island’s history.

68 people traveled and one of them, Libby Weir-Breen, made the trip from Scotland just to be able to say she was there for just one day. “I have never felt so excited in my whole life. I never thought I would see this day,” the woman said.

The inhabitants of the Cape, from where the ships left for Saint Helena, were able to travel more frequently without problems to the island with which they had forged links from the beginning.

When the planes got to the airport, the planes only stayed 45 minutes and then came back. There were also some who toured up Ascension, another neighboring British overseas territory.

The unfortunate definition used four years ago by the British media did not coincide with the view of Lisa phillips, governor of the island.

“Vi los titulares sobre el aeropuerto más inútil del mundo, pero para Santa Elena este ya es el aeropuerto más útil. No tiene precio”, dijo la funcionaria tras el primer vuelo comercial, y aseguró que la historia del territorio cambió desde la llegada Track.

There were significant social and economic effects after the creation of the airport. The territory has emerged from the state of “eternal” isolation in which it found itself.

In 2019, for example, 8000 people arrived to the city, a high number if we take into account the number of inhabitants of Santa Elena. A fiber optic cable has also been added to the creation of the track, which will improve the internet from 2022.

Currently, the authorities plan to establish links with the United Kingdom without having to go through South Africa or Ascención and flights to South America, more specifically to the Falkland Islands.

For now, the airport is closed due to the global context and only operates a few flights to Ascención, from where planes leave for the United Kingdom.

The island of Saint Helena is world famous for having been the place where Napoleon Bonaparte spent his last days. The French conqueror was sent prisoner to the territory in 1815 and died there in 1921.