President inaugurates land reclamation project for airport development

President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, on Monday, inaugurated the land reclamation project to build the new runway in Ibrahim Nasir International Airport – part of the large government project to re-develop the entire airport.

About 60 hectors of land will be reclaimed to build the new runway a task assigned to Beijing Urban Construction Group (BUCG).

Maldives Airports Company Limited reported that the runway will be 3,400 meters and 60 meters wide.

The airport development project also includes a 120,000-ton cargo terminal and a fuel farm with the capacity to store 45 million liters of fuel.

Speaking to reporters regarding the project, Minister of Economic Affairs Mohamed Saeed said that it will take approximately 4 months to reclaim the land, sheet pile it, and level the ground.

“This will be different from previous land reclamation projects. We are building a Code F runway. The Code F runway needs to be strong enough for A 380 size aircrafts to land. We want it to be of quality so that it cannot be no longer used along the way,” said Saeed.

Managing Director of MACL, Adhil Moosa said that INIA will be one of the best airports in the region, once the re-development project is complete, in 2018.