Santa Maria Airport (Azores)

In the context of the Second World War, in July 1941, a Portuguese mission under the command of engineer Colonel Hermínio José de Sousa Serrano, and which included Colonel Frederico Lopes da Silva and Major Fernando Tártaro, visited Santa Maria to study a possible location for an airfield, opting for the plateau known as Pico de Maria Dias. Two years later, technicians from Pan American World Airways arrived on the island, arriving on board the NT Lima in December 1943, and confirmed that the location was optimal for establishing a military airfield to complement the field at Lajes. The airfield would, therefore, assist in the protection of the maritime convoys that crossed the Atlantic to support the port of Murmansk in the Soviet Union, which were being sunk by German U-boats. • Construction of two piers at the port; • Expansion of the wharf and ramp; • Improvements to the roads, bends and bridges; • Construction of a roadway to the aerodrome; • Construction of three runways: 2 and 1 , with an area of ; • A platform/tarmac for parking aircraft that was ; • A control tower and station building; and • A water supply and sewage network. Military airfield used to lodge members of the military While the final project was being prepared, the Portuguese Department of Defense authorized immediate execution of the first work, On 8 August 1944, at about 2:15 p.m., the first plane landed on the runway, a Douglas C-47 Skytrain (Dakota C-47) operated by the US Air Force, transporting materials and bread from Terceira. The aerodrome was operated by American forces until the end of the conflict, and accounted for 500 airplanes that transited the site. Civil aviation The accords between the Portuguese, Great Britain and the United States permitted those forces to use the facilities in Lajes and Santa Maria until 2 June 1946. Other records refer to a Pan American Lockheed Constellation stopping on the same day. Communications were limited to teletype and radio. With the 1965 installation of coaxial cable between the United States and England, all communications between the two continents began to intersect at Santa Maria. Commencing in the late 1970s, Air France's supersonic Concordes were routed via Santa Maria as a technical stop for refueling on weekly scheduled SST flights between Paris and Caracas. Along with the airports in Lisbon, Porto, Faro, Flores, Horta, Ponta Delgada and Beja, the airport's concessions to provide support to civil aviation were conceded to ANA Aeroportos de Portugal on 18 December 1998, under provisions of decree 404/98. With this concession, ANA was also provided to the planning, development and construction of future infrastructures. ==District==

The airport at Santa Maria was part of a larger complex of buildings and infrastructures constructed in the 20th century. Apart from the airport terminals and ground control facilities, the area later known as Aeroporto locally, included a residential barrio, the services and equipment to support local residences, roadways and many of first signals, public transport stops and electrical transformer stations. The development of this district was important in the development of the island, with many of the installations left by American troops after the Second World War (the early terminal, control tower, building of Clube Asas do Atlântico, gymnasium, cinemas and warehouses) and many of the semi-cylindrical troop-quarters retained after the withdraw of forces. Its North American influence and original purpose marks its differences to local construction; the urban design and buildings, just like many of the projected constructions by architect Keil do Amaral (the airport, residence of airport director, groups of residences and signalling) make the district distinct from the other areas of the island. The newer neighborhoods and recent buildings, are of an inferior architectural quality, and correspond to the blocks closer to the airport. ==Airlines and destinations==

The following airlines operate regular scheduled and charter flights at Santa Maria Airport: ==Statistics==

• Air France Flight 009, a Lockheed Constellation flying from Paris to New York, struck the Redondo Mountain on the approach to its intermediate stop at Santa Maria on 28 October 1949. All 11 crew members and 37 passengers on board were killed, including French boxing champion Marcel Cerdan and French classical violinist Ginette Neveu. Probable causes included poor reporting by the crew and failure to carry out approach procedures. • A chartered Boeing 707-300 (N7231T), Independent Air Flight 1851 from Bergamo, Italy, in 1989 crashed on approach to Santa Maria Airport, when it struck the Pico Alto mountain. The aircraft was destroyed with the loss of all passengers (137) and crew (7). The accident was the result of bad communication and failure to follow standard procedures by crew and air traffic control. • An Avianca Airlines Boeing 787 traveling from Madrid to Bogota had to make an emergency landing at SMA on 23 June 2018 when an electrical system in the airplane triggered an alarm. • An Avianca Airlines Boeing 787 traveling from Madrid to Bogota made an emergency landing at SMA on 30 November 2023 due to yet-unspecified technical problems. ==See also==