One of my favorite airports in the world (have yet to visit) is Osaka’s Kansai Airport. Also known as KIX (ICAO: RJBB), the airport is 100% man made, which also includes the land it sits on. The airport started off with just one runway (6/24) and had a second (6L/24R) added to allow for 24 hour airport operations in September 2007.
The terminal building, which has some breathtaking architectural inspiration, is the largest of its kind in the world at 1.7 kilometers from end to end.
If you’re anything like me, you’ll enjoy browsing through these (not for real flying) approach and departure procedure charts for Kansai.
Another interesting fact is that the bridge that connects the island airport to the mainland necessitated an evolution in weather radar systems because it is so large it was creating a false windshear indication for arriving aircraft.
Here’s part one (of five). The remaining four can be found after the jump.
This post was originally published to the internet between 2007 and 2012. Links, images, and embedded media from that era may no longer function as intended.
This post originally appeared at Flightglobal.com from 2007 to 2012.