Kinston Jetport originally was built in 1944 by the
United States Navy. It opened in October as a
United States Marine Corps flying training airfield known as
Marine Corps Auxiliary Airfield Kinston, being an auxiliary to
Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point. Naval Aviation Cadets received V-5 flight training along with basic flying indoctrination at the airfield until the facility was closed on 31 October 1945. As a result of the
Cold War and the expansion of the
United States Air Force,
Kinston Air Base* was reopened on 17 October 1950 by the USAF
Air Training Command, as a contract flying training school with
T-34 Mentor,
T-6 Texan and
T-28 Trojan aircraft. In May 1952, the Air Force renamed Kinston Airfield as
Stallings Air Base in memory of Kinston natives Lt Bruce Stallings, a
P-51 Mustang pilot killed in March 1945, and his brother, Lt Harry Stallings, a
B-29 Superfortress navigator killed in April 1945. In April 1957, ATC proposed that the contract training program at Stallings AB be closed. The recommendation was approved in September and on 1 October, flying training ended at Stallings. The base was formally inactivated on 27 November 1957. The present air terminal opened in July 1978. The airport served as a regional facility for eastern North Carolina and was listed in timetables for
Piedmont Airlines as
Kinston/Goldsboro/Greenville/Camp LeJeune, NC. As the nearby cities of Greenville, New Bern and Jacksonville, NC built up their own service in the 1980s and 1990s, passenger traffic at Kinston declined until all airline service was discontinued by the beginning of 2000. Later attempts were made to revive commercial air service but were unsuccessful.
Historical airline service Piedmont Airlines provided service from Kinston to various destinations in North Carolina and Virginia from the early 1950s. By the early 1980s, Piedmont operated scheduled routes connecting Kinston to
Atlanta, New York
LaGuardia Airport,
Richmond, VA,
Washington National, and
Wilmington, NC using a combination of
Boeing 727-200, and
Boeing 737-200 jets as well as
YS-11 and
F-27 prop aircraft. Nonstop flights to
Charlotte Douglas International Airport were added in 1981 and to
Baltimore/Washington International Airport in 1984. Charlotte and Baltimore would become major hubs for Piedmont.
Piedmont Commuter service operated by
CCAir and
Henson supplemented Piedmont's service. Piedmont merged into
USAir on August 5, 1989 and USAir continued to serve Kinston with mainline
Fokker F28 jets until May, 1992.
USAir Express service operated by
CCAir (formerly Piedmont Commuter) continued to serve Kinston until January 2, 2000; its withdrawal left Kinston without scheduled service.
American Airlines briefly served Kinston with flights to
Raleigh-Durham International Airport from May through October, 1990 by way of its
American Eagle partner,
Nashville Eagle.
Jetstream 31 commuter aircraft were flown.
Delta Air Lines began scheduled service from Kinston to Atlanta in March, 2005 by was of its
Delta Connection partner,
Atlantic Southeast Airlines, using
Bombardier CRJ100/200 regional jets. Delta soon found the service consistently unprofitable, due in large part to many travelers driving to nearby
Raleigh-Durham, and terminated the service on January 5, 2007.
Allegiant Air operated a twice weekly flight to
Orlando Sanford International Airport from November 2006 to April, 2008 using
McDonnell Douglas MD-80 aircraft. Kinston was also served by other commuter airlines.
Wheeler Airlines served the airport briefly in 1976 and again in 1985 with flights to Raleigh-Durham, Richmond, and Washington DC.
Sunbird Airlines provided service to Charlotte and Raleigh Durham from 1980 until early 1985 using
Cessna 402 and
Beechcraft Model 99 aircraft. The carrier returned to Kinston by August 1985 operating as
Piedmont Commuter and changed its name to
CCAir in early 1986. ==Airlines and destinations==