National policies Canada Canada's unusual codes, which bear little to no similarity with any conventional abbreviation to the city's name (such as
YUL in
Montréal and
YYZ in
Toronto), originated from the two-letter codes used to identify weather reporting stations in the 1930s. The letters preceding the two-letter code follow the following format: • Y – for
"Yes", this letter was used when the station shared its location with an airport. • W – for
"Without", when the weather-reporting station did not share its location with an airport. • U – used when the station was located together with a
non-directional beacon (NDB). • X – suggesting that the last two letters of a code were already in use by a Canadian airport. • Z – indicated that an airport code had been used for the identification of an airport in the U.S. Most large airports in Canada have codes that begin with the letter "Y", although not all "Y" codes are Canadian (for example,
YUM for
Yuma, Arizona, and
YNT for
Yantai, China), and not all Canadian airports start with the letter "Y" (for example,
ZBF for
Bathurst, New Brunswick). Many Canadian airports have a code that starts with W, X or Z, but none of these are major airports. When the
Canadian transcontinental railways were built, each station was assigned its own two-letter
Morse code: • VR for
Vancouver • TZ for
Toronto • QB for
Quebec City • WG for
Winnipeg • SJ for
Saint John • YC for
Calgary • OW for
Ottawa • EG for
Edmonton When the Canadian government established airports, it used the existing railway codes for them as well. If the airport had a weather station, authorities added a "Y" to the front of the code, meaning "Yes" to indicate it had a weather station or some other letter to indicate it did not. When international codes were created in cooperation with the United States, because "Y" was seldom used in the United States, Canada simply used the weather station codes for its airports, changing the "Y" to a "Z" if it conflicted with an airport code already in use. The result is that most major Canadian airport codes start with "Y" followed by two letters in the city's name, based on the transcontiential railroad two-letter Morse code, as mentioned above (for example,
YOW for
Ottawa,
YWG for
Winnipeg,
YYC for
Calgary, or
YVR for
Vancouver), whereas other Canadian airports append the two-letter code of the radio beacons that were the closest to the actual airport, such as
YQX in
Gander or
YXS in
Prince George. Four of the ten provincial capital airports in Canada have ended up with codes beginning with YY, including: •
YYZ for
Toronto, Ontario •
YYJ for
Victoria, British Columbia •
YYT for
St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador •
YYG for
Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island Canada's largest airport is YYZ for
Toronto Pearson (as YTZ was already allocated to
Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, the airport was given the station code of
Malton, Mississauga, where it is located). YUL is used for
Montréal–Trudeau (UL was the ID code for the beacon in the city of
Kirkland. While these codes make it difficult for the public to associate them with a particular Canadian city, some codes have become popular in usage despite their cryptic nature, particularly at the largest airports. Toronto's code has entered pop culture in the form of "
YYZ", a song by the rock band
Rush, which utilizes the Morse code signal as a musical motif. Some airports have started using their IATA codes as
brand names, such as
Calgary International Airport (YYC) and
Vancouver International Airport (YVR).
New Zealand Several New Zealand airports use codes that contain the letter Z, to distinguish them from similar airport names in other countries. Some examples are
HLZ for
Hamilton,
ZQN for
Queenstown, and
WSZ for
Westport.
United States Since the
United States Navy reserved "N" codes, and to prevent confusion with
Federal Communications Commission broadcast call signs, which begin with "W" or "K", the airports of certain U.S. cities whose name begins with one of these letters had to adopt "irregular" airport codes: •
APC for
Napa, California •
Colombo (CMB) –
Bandaranaike (CMB) and
Ratmalana (RML) •
Dakar (DKR) –
Senghor (DKR) and
Diass (DSS) •
Dallas–Fort Worth (DFW) –
Self-named (DFW),
Love Field (DAL),
Meacham (FTW),
Alliance (AFW), and
Addison (ADS) •
Dubai (DXB) –
Self-named (DXB) and
Al Maktoum (DWC) •
Goa (GOI) –
Dabolim (GOI) and
Manohar (GOX) •
Glasgow (GLA) –
International (GLA) and
Prestwick (PIK) •
Houston (HOU) –
Hobby (HOU),
George Bush Intercontinental (IAH), and
Ellington (EFD) •
Istanbul (IST) –
Self-named (IST),
Sabiha Gökçen (SAW), and
Atatürk (ISL, formerly IST) •
Johannesburg (JNB) –
O. R. Tambo (formerly Jan Smuts) (JNB) and
Lanseria (HLA) •
Kuala Lumpur (KUL) –
Sepang (KUL) and
Subang (SZB, formerly KUL) •
Kyiv (IEV) –
Zhuliany (IEV) and
Boryspil (KBP) •
Los Angeles (LAX) –
Self-named (LAX),
San Bernardino (SBD),
Ontario (ONT),
Orange County (SNA),
Van Nuys (VNY),
Palmdale (PMD),
Long Beach (LGB), and
Burbank (BUR) •
Medan (MES) –
Soewondo (formerly Polonia) (MES) and
Kualanamu (KNO) •
Medellín (MDE) –
José María Córdova (MDE) and
Olaya Herrera (EOH) •
Mexico City (MEX) –
Benito Juárez (MEX) and
Felipe Ángeles (NLU) •
Melbourne (MEL) –
Tullamarine (MEL),
Essendon (MEB), and
Avalon (AVV) •
Miami (MIA) –
Self-named (MIA),
Fort Lauderdale (FLL), and
West Palm Beach (PBI) •
Mumbai (BOM) –
Shivaji (BOM, formerly Sahar and Santa Cruz),
Navi Mumbai (NMI), and
Juhu Aerodrome •
Nagoya (NGO) –
Centrair (NGO) and
Komaki (NKM, formerly NGO) •
San Diego –
Self-named (SAN) and
Tijuana (TIJ). TIJ is physically located in
Tijuana, Mexico, but offers access directly to and from the US via the
Cross Border Xpress. •
San Francisco (SFO) –
Self-named (SFO),
Oakland (OAK),
San Jose–Mineta (SJC), and
Sonoma–Schulz (STS) •
Seattle (SEA) –
Tacoma (Sea–Tac) (SEA),
Boeing Field (BFI), and
Paine Field (PAE) •
Shanghai (SHA) –
Pudong (PVG) and
Hongqiao (SHA) •
Sydney (SYD) –
Self-named (SYD),
Bankstown (BWU), and
Western Sydney (WSI) •
Taipei (TPE) –
Taoyuan (formerly Chiang Kai-shek) (TPE) and
Songshan (TSA, formerly TPE) •
Tehran (THR) –
Imam Khomeini (IKA) and
Mehrabad (THR) •
Tel Aviv (TLV) –
Ben Gurion (TLV) and (formerly)
Sde Dov (SDV) •
Yogyakarta (JOG) —
Adisutjipto (JOG) and
International (YIA) When different cities with the same name each have an airport, they need to be assigned different codes. Examples include: •
Juan Santamaría International Airport (SJO) is in
Alajuela, serving the capital
San José de Costa Rica. While
Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC) is in
San Jose, California, the United States. •
Birmingham–Shuttlesworth International Airport (BHM) is in
Birmingham, Alabama, the United States and
Birmingham Airport (BHX) is in
Birmingham, England, United Kingdom. •
Portland International Jetport (PWM) is in
Portland, Maine, while
Portland International Airport (PDX) is in
Portland, Oregon. •
Manchester Airport (MAN) is in
Manchester, England, United Kingdom, while
Manchester-Boston Regional Airport (MHT) is in
Manchester,
New Hampshire, United States. •
Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport (SCL) is in
Santiago, Chile; while
Antonio Maceo Airport (SCU) is in
Santiago, Cuba;
Santiago–Rosalía de Castro Airport (SCQ) is in
Santiago de Compostela, Spain; and
Cibao International Airport (STI) serves
Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic. •
Ingeniero Ambrosio L.V. Taravella International Airport (COR) is in
Córdoba, Argentina; while
Córdoba Airport (ODB) is in
Córdoba, Spain. Sometimes, a new airport is built, replacing the old one, leaving the city's new "major" airport (or the only remaining airport) code to no longer correspond with the city's name. The original airport in Nashville, Tennessee, was built in 1936 as part of the Works Progress Administration and called Berry Field with the designation, BNA. A new facility known as Nashville International Airport was built in 1987 but still uses BNA. This is in conjunction to rules aimed to avoid confusion that seem to apply in the United States, which state that "the first and second letters or second and third letters of an identifier may not be duplicated with less than 200
nautical miles separation." •
Knoxville uses
TYS for
Charles McGhee Tyson, whose family donated the land for the first airport in Knoxville •
Kahului, the main gateway into
Maui, uses
OGG in homage to Hawaiian aviation pioneer Bertram J. Hogg •
Gold Coast, Australia, uses
OOL due to its former name as Coolangatta Airport,
named after the suburb in which it is located •
Sunshine Coast, Australia, uses
MCY due to its former names Maroochydore Airport and Maroochydore-Sunshine Coast Airport. It is actually located in
Marcoola rather than Maroochydore. •
Buli Airport uses PGQ, for its location in the
Pekaulang administrative division. •
New River Valley Airport uses PSK for its location in
Pulaski County, Virginia. •
Río Amazonas Airport uses PTZ for its location in
Pastaza Province. •
Brackett Field uses POC, as it was named after a flying enthusiast and faculty member of nearby
Pomona College. •
Yan'an Nanniwan Airport inherited the ENY code from the city of
Yan'an's old airport,
Yan'an Ershilipu Airport. •
Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport uses the code ECP, which when proposed was thought it could stand for "Everyone Can Party" • Similarly,
Laughlin/Bullhead International Airport uses IFP, for "International Fun Place." •
Franklin County Airport (Tennessee) uses UOS due to its proximity to the
University of the South. In Asia, codes that do not correspond with their city's names include
Niigata's
KIJ,
Nanchang's
KHN and
Pyongyang's
FNJ. A rare exception to airport codes staying constant even after name changes is the
primary international airport in New York City. Initially known as Idlewild Airport and given the code IDL, it was changed to John F. Kennedy International Airport in 1963 following the
assassination of the president. The name change came with a new code, KIA for "
Kennedy
International
Airport". However, this code would gain a negative association with the onset of the
Vietnam War as the term "
killed in action" was commonly abbreviated KIA. Airport authorities applied to the IATA to change the code in 1968, giving the airport its well-known code of JFK.
Multiple codes for a single airport EuroAirport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg, which serves three countries, has three airport codes: BSL, MLH, EAP. • The French part of the airport is assigned MLH, for
Mulhouse, France • The Swiss part of the airport is assigned BSL, for
Basel, Switzerland • The airport also has a Metropolitan Area Code, EAP, for EuroAirport.
Airport codes using the English name of the city Some cities have a local name in their respective language which is different from the name in English, yet the airport code represents
only the English name. Examples include: •
BKK –
Bangkok, Thailand () •
CAI –
Cairo, Egypt () •
CGN –
Cologne, Germany () •
CPH –
Copenhagen, Denmark () •
DEL –
Delhi, India () •
DUB –
Dublin, Ireland () •
FLR –
Florence, Italy () •
GVA –
Geneva, Switzerland () •
HAV –
Havana, Cuba () •
LKO –
Lucknow, India () •
PRG –
Prague, Czechia () •
VCE –
Venice, Italy () •
VIE –
Vienna, Austria ()
Scarcity of codes Due to scarcity of codes (the three-character code is used by a maximum of 17,576 airports worldwide only), some airports are given codes with letters not found in their names: •
ACI ("Alderney, Channel Islands") for
Alderney,
Guernsey •
BGO for
Bergen, Norway •
CWB for
Curitiba, Brazil •
DAD for
Da Nang, Vietnam •
FNJ for
Pyongyang, North Korea ;Use of 'X' as a filler The use of 'X' as a filler letter is a practice to create three-letter identifiers when more straightforward options were unavailable: •
MMX for
Malmö, Sweden •
CNX for
Chiang Mai, Thailand (e.g.
CMX was already allocated to
Houghton County Memorial Airport in the United States) •
MXX for
Mora–Siljan Airport, Sweden •
DXB for
Dubai, United Arab Emirates (
DUB was already allocated to
Dublin Airport, Ireland) •
MXP for
Milan, Italy (located outside of the city) •
GRX for
Granada, Spain (e.g. GRA was already allocated to
Gamarra Airport in Colombia) •
PDX for
Portland, Oregon •
PHX for
Phoenix ==See also==