Qualla: Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981)

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): Introduction

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Throughout the 1940s, there was no terminal. There was no passenger service. There was a sand-packed strip where camels sometimes wandered across the runway, and flights had to be arranged by hand when they happened at all. This was Jeddah Airport, also called Kandara Aerodrome, and it was the first airport in Saudi Arabia. By 1981, when it closed, it was handling 600 aircraft movements a day at the peak of Hajj and receiving a flight every three minutes on its best days. In the space of forty years, it had transformed from a muddy dirt field into the busiest pilgrim airport in the world, and then it had been outgrown.

Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): From Six Aircraft in a Crate

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. On 6 August 1921, the steamship SS Tantah arrived at Jeddah carrying aircraft, the first ever delivered to what would become Saudi Arabia. Later that month, six more arrived from Italy: four Caudron G.3 biplanes with Le Rhône engines and two Maurice Farman trainers. By September,...

Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): The Pilgrim City

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ammar shaker, Public domain. By 1958, as the number of African hajj pilgrims flying in began to rise, Saudi Arabia built what was called the third city directly inside the airport. Five three-story buildings covered 9,652 square meters and housed 2,000 pilgrims at a time. Dormitory rooms slept anywhere from ...

Image: Ammar shaker | Public domain

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): The Boom Years

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ammar shaker, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1952, the airport was officially inaugurated under Prince Saud bin Abdulaziz, and the Royal Saudi Air Force raised its flag over the first hangar. In 1953, Aéroport de Paris oversaw construction upgrades and the first civilian air traffic control tower in the country. Saudia (...

Image: Ammar shaker | CC BY-SA 4.0

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): Too Small For Its Own Success

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ammar shaker 18:24, 9 July 2007 (UTC), Public domain. The problem was geography. Kandara sat pressed between the neighborhoods of Al-Kandara and Al-Sharafiya, close to downtown Jeddah. There was nowhere to expand. Cargo could not be handled properly: it had to be brought ashore by helicopter. In the ten days before Hajj, the airport...

Image: Ammar shaker 18:24, 9 July 2007 (UTC) | Public domain

Jeddah International Airport (closed 1981): What the Runway Became

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit مريم محمد روادي, CC0. Shortly after closure, a highway was laid across the former runways, its tarmac running through what had been the aircraft boneyard. Google Earth imagery from 2000 still showed the faded markings of runway 15R/33L, 9,843 feet long. By 2008, the original hangars from the 1930s had...

Image: مريم محمد روادي | CC0