Celebrations as 30 years fly by at airport

YESTERDAY marked the 30th anniversary of the first air services to and from the south-east of Ireland, when the new IR£1.5 million Waterford Airport was granted an operational licence.

The occasion was marked at the time with a 25-minute flight from Dublin on an Avair 30-seat aircraft. The airline’s chief pilot Captain Hank Vanderzee was at the controls, while passengers included airport manager Chris Hennessy and Avair managing director Gerry Connolly.

The airport was granted its full flying wings in March 1982, when the Department of Transport and Power sanctioned a licence for international flights.

This coincided with an announcement by Avair that a twice-weekly midday scheduled service between Dublin and Waterford would start on March 29.

The single fare for the journey was set at IR£24 while a return ticket cost IR£46.

Operated by start-up airline Ryanair, Waterford’s first international scheduled air service left the airport for London Gatwick on Monday, July 8 of 1985. The twin turbo prop aircraft in use on the route could seat 15 passengers while the trip was scheduled to take 90 minutes each way.

The airport is also now home to the Irish Coastguard Search and Rescue helicopter base and the Pilot Training College of Ireland, as well as a base for regular passenger flights with Aer Arann Regional.

Reflecting yesterday on 30 years of development at the airport, chief executive Graham Doyle said it had been “a remarkable journey with lots of twists and turns, peaks and troughs” but much had been achieved thanks to a lot of work by many people over three decades.

“While certainly not unaffected by the economic climate, we look to the future with confidence based on what has been achieved to date and the level of support the airport enjoys from passengers and stakeholders across the south-east, as well as from our inbound passengers in the UK and our various business partners,” he said.

Recalling other events in Waterford in December 1981 he added: “It was the first trading Christmas for the new George’s Court shopping centre which opened in a site assembled around the former Hearne’s department store with an initial 14 outlets on 12,000 square feet. Phase two of that successful development was already being planned to take advantage of the proposed pedestrianisation of George’s Street.”

Picture: Celebrating Waterford Airport’s 30th birthday yesterday were staff members Joanne Mahony in an airport uniform from the 1980s, Nicola Kelleher in a uniform from the 90s and Aoife Maloney in a look from the noughties. Picture: Patrick Browne