The City of El Paso built the first
El Paso Municipal Airport near the east side of the
Franklin Mountains in 1928. Alderman
Robert N. Mullin was credited as the person responsible for getting the airport built. The airport was closed by 1945 and in more recent times has been home to the Jobe Concrete Products "Planeport" cement factory. In 1934,
Varney Speed Lines (now
United Airlines) operated at the original El Paso Municipal Airport (now closed). The original El Paso Municipal Airport construction was inspired by a visit from
Charles Lindbergh. What became today's El Paso International Airport was built as
Standard Airport by Standard Airlines in 1929 for transcontinental air mail service. Standard Airlines became a division of
American Airlines in the 1930s. In 1936, American Airlines "swapped" airports with the City of El Paso, and El Paso International Airport was born. An expansion that tripled the size of the terminal occurred in 1971. A new structure for ticketing and bag claim was built in front of the old terminal and two passenger concourses were built behind the old terminal, retaining the old terminal in the middle, the outline of which can still be recognized today. It was designed by Garland & Hilles. Serving
general aviation at El Paso International Airport, Cutter Aviation established a
fixed-base operation in 1982. Cutter Aviation moved to a new facility on Shuttle Columbia Drive in 2006. Atlantic Aviation also serves general aviation at ELP.
Historical airline service Standard Air Lines began the first scheduled commercial passenger and mail service to El Paso on February 4, 1928, with a route to Los Angeles making stops in Douglas, Tucson, and Phoenix, Arizona. The carrier began using a Fokker F-7 aircraft and soon upgraded to a Fokker F-10 trimotor.
Maddux Air Lines soon followed beginning service on February 23, 1929, with nearly the same route as Standard Air Lines however Maddux continued on from Los Angeles to San Francisco. Maddux used a Ford trimotor aircraft but the service ended later in 1929 by the time of the great stock market crash.
Western Air Express replaced Standard on the route to Los Angeles for a short time in 1930 and extended service eastward from El Paso to Dallas stopping at Big Spring, Abilene, and Fort Worth, Texas. American Airways then took over the route beginning on October 15, 1930, and later extended the route eastward all the way to New York, stopping at Little Rock, Memphis, Nashville, and Washington D.C. as well as several other points. The carrier changed its name to
American Airlines in 1934.
Douglas DC-3 aircraft were primarily used in the latter 1930s through 1940s followed by
Convair 240's and
Douglas DC-6's in the 1950s. A new route to
Monterrey and
Mexico City,
Mexico was flown from 1943 through 1957 and direct service to
San Francisco was added in 1948. Through the 1950s, American partnered with
Continental Airlines offering an interchange service where American's flights from
Los Angeles and San Francisco, stopping in
Phoenix, would continue eastward through El Paso as Continental's flights to
San Antonio and
Houston using the same Douglas DC-6 aircraft. The interchange flights ended in 1961 when American received its own authority to serve the El Paso-
San Antonio-Houston route. American
Boeing 707 and
Boeing 727 jets began serving El Paso in the early 1960s and widebody
Douglas DC-10 jets began service on nonstop flights to
Dallas in 1972. The stop at
Douglas, Arizona, on westbound flights ended in the mid-1960s and new nonstop service to
Chicago was added in 1969. Direct flights to San Antonio, Houston,
Tucson, and San Francisco ended after airline deregulation in 1978 and American's service to Dallas, Chicago, Phoenix, and Los Angeles continues today. From 1929 to 1931, Mid-Continent Air Express operated a route from El Paso to
Denver stopping at
Albuquerque,
Santa Fe,
Las Vegas, NM,
Pueblo, and
Colorado Springs. From 1931 through 1934, Western Air Express took over this route and extended it onto
Cheyenne, WY.
Continental Airlines was the second major airline to serve El Paso. The carrier began as
Varney Speed Lines in 1934 operating the northerly route from El Paso but only to Pueblo, Colorado, with stops at Albuquerque and several other points in New Mexico and Colorado. The name was changed to Continental Air Lines in 1937 and the route was extended back to Denver. A new route to
Carlsbad,
Hobbs, and
Roswell, New Mexico, was added in 1940 followed by new routes to
San Antonio and to
Kansas City with several stops by the mid-1940s. Continental primarily used
Lockheed Model 10 Electra and
Lockheed Model 18 Lodestar aircraft in the 1930s followed by
Douglas DC-3's in the 1940s. Larger
Convair 240,
Convair 340, and
Douglas DC-6 aircraft were introduced in the 1950s followed by the
Vickers Viscount by 1959. The San Antonio route was extended to Houston by the early 1950s at which time Continental partnered with
American Airlines to offer interchange service from Houston and San Antonio to Los Angeles and San Francisco by way of El Paso. Service to
Alamogordo, New Mexico, was added in 1954 but discontinued in 1963, transferring the route to
Frontier Airlines. New nonstop service to Dallas began in 1959, and in the early 1960s Continental received its own authority to operate westbound from El Paso to Los Angeles with stops in Tucson and Phoenix. Jet service began in the early 1960s with
Boeing 707 and
Boeing 720 jets on the Los Angeles-El Paso-Houston route which also made stops at Phoenix, Tucson,
Midland and San Antonio.
Douglas DC-9 jets arrived in 1966 which began jet service on the routes to Dallas, Albuquerque and Denver, and also the route to Kansas City that stopped in Midland,
Lubbock, and
Wichita Falls,
Texas, as well as
Lawton, Oklahoma City, and
Tulsa,
Oklahoma. The service to the smaller cities in southeastern New Mexico ended in 1963 (retiring the DC-3 aircraft) and was transferred to Trans Texas Airlines. Continental was operating all jets by 1967 and El Paso became a small hub through the 1970s with up to five flights on the ground at a time using a new rotunda shaped gate area on the end of the east concourse. A widebody
Douglas DC-10 was operated on a Los-Angeles-El Paso-San Antonio-Houston flight, eastbound only, in the latter 1970s. Service to the Mexican resort cities of Acapulco, La Paz, Los Cabos, Manzanillo, and Puerto Vallarta was operated from 1979 through 1981. After airline deregulation in 1978, Continental slowly downsized its El Paso operation to flights only serving its hubs at Denver and Houston. For a few years in the early 1990s, nonstop flights to Mexico City were operated.
Continental Express service to
Alamogordo, Carlsbad, and
Roswell, New Mexico, was briefly operated in 1987. The Denver flights ended in 1994 and new Continental Express service with regional jets began replacing Continental's mainline jets to Houston in the 2000s. Continental merged into
United Airlines in 2012.
Trans-Texas Airways was the third carrier to serve El Paso. Trans-Texas began operating in 1947 solely within the state of Texas and El Paso was the western terminus for flights from Dallas and Houston that made many stops at small communities throughout central and west Texas. Trans-Texas operated
Douglas DC-3 aircraft and flights from El Paso would stop at
Marfa,
Alpine,
Pecos,
Ft. Stockton, and several other communities. In 1963, new routes were established to Carlsbad, Hobbs, and Roswell, New Mexico while the initial routes to most of the small Texas cities were discontinued. Larger
Convair 240 and
Convair 600 aircraft replaced the DC-3's in the mid-1960s. In 1969 the carrier changed its name to
Texas International Airlines and new
Douglas DC-9 jets began flights from El Paso to Houston making stops in
Midland,
San Angelo and
Austin. These flights ended in 1971. For the next several years only a single flight to Carlsbad, Hobbs,
Big Spring,
Brownwood, and Dallas was operated using a Convair-600. A DC-9 jet flight to Dallas, stopping in Roswell and Midland, operated for a period in 1975. All service to El Paso ended in 1977 but was reinstated in 1980 when nonstop jet flights to Dallas began. Texas International merged into Continental Airlines in 1982 at which time the Dallas flights ended.
Frontier Airlines (1950-1986) began a route from El Paso to Phoenix in 1950 that made stops in
Las Cruses,
Deming,
Silver City and
Lordsburg, New Mexico, as well as
Clifton,
Safford,
Globe and
Superior, Arizona.
Douglas DC-3 aircraft were used and the service ended in 1955. Frontier returned to El Paso in 1963 with a route to Alamogordo and Albuquerque, New Mexico, which eventually continued to
Salt Lake City.
Convair 580 aircraft were used on this route and in 1967 Frontier began nonstop flights to Albuquerque and onto Denver with
Boeing 727 jets. The 727's were later swapped out with
Boeing 737-200 jets and new service to several points in Mexico was established from 1978 through 1984. These Mexican destinations included
Guadalajara,
Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo, Manzanillo,
Mazatlán, and Puerto Vallarta. Frontier ceased operating in 1986, and a new
Frontier Airlines was established in 1994 with Boeing 737 flights to Albuquerque and Denver.
Southwest Airlines began flights from El Paso to Dallas, Lubbock, and Midland/
Odessa in 1977 using
Boeing 737-200's and continually added new service, becoming the largest carrier at El Paso by the early 1980s.
Delta Air Lines and
United Airlines also began service in the 1980s. Since airline deregulation went into effect in late 1978, many other carriers have served El Paso including
Eastern Airlines,
Western Airlines,
America West Airlines,
USAir,
Northwest Airlines,
TWA,
Aerolitoral (feeder carrier for
AeroMexico), and
Lineas Aereas Azteca. At least 15 smaller commuter airlines have also provided service to points in southern New Mexico, southeast Arizona, and to
Chihuahua, Mexico, from the 1960s through the 1990s.
2026 airspace closure On the night of February 10, 2026, without any advance warning, the
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced that most of El Paso's
airspace would be closed to all civil aviation for 10 days, which effectively shut down El Paso International to the alarm of local leaders. The FAA said the restriction was enacted for "special security reasons" but did not state the underlying justification. At 7 a.m. on February 11, less than eight hours after it was imposed, the FAA lifted the
temporary flight restriction and said it was prompted by a "
cartel drone incursion". This was the first sudden closure of US airspace for security reasons since the
September 11 attacks in 2001. The episode resulted in the cancellation of seven arriving and seven departing passenger flights. ==Facilities==