Tuscaloosa National Airport

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Tuscaloosa National Airport (IATA Airport code TCL), formerly Van De Graaff Field and Tuscaloosa Regional Airport, is a public airport located three miles northwest of the central business district of Tuscaloosa, in Tuscaloosa County. It is owned by the City of Tuscaloosa.

The first aviation activity in the city began in 1939 when Oliver Parks established a Civilian Pilot Training Program at the University of Alabama. The turf airfield with four runways was serviced from a small brick hanger. It was dedicated in 1940 in honor of Coleman Van de Graaff, who had advocated for building such a facility and successfully lobbied for federal funding.

During World War II the facility was designated as an intermediate field by the Civil Aeronautics Administration and operated as a pilot training field by the U.S. Army Air Forces, serving a detachment from the 51st Flying Training Group from Greenville Army Airfield in Mississippi. The Alabama Institute of Aeronautics provided contract instruction on Fairchild PT-19s, PT-17 Stearmans, and P-40 Warhawks. Free French Air Force flight cadets graduating from preflight screening at Craig Field in Selma were brought to Van de Graaff Field for primary flight training beginning in June 1943. Military use of the airfield ended in September 1944. The War Assets Administration turned the facility back over to municipal use.

Southern Airways began offering passenger service on its DC-3 airliners in June 1949. The airfield's main runway, designated 11/29, was paved in the early 1950s. Another northeast-southwest (4/22) runway was constructed in 1970 along with the first passenger terminal. By the mid-1970s Tuscaloosa enjoyed daily passenger flights to Atlanta, Georgia; Memphis, Tennessee; and New Orleans, Louisiana, and another daily arrival from Columbus, Mississippi. Southern's successor, Republic Airlines, ended that service in 1984. Sunbelt Airlines briefly filled the gap with service to Memphis, but did not continue after the first summer.

Meanwhile, Atlantic Southeast Airlines provided direct service to Atlanta from 1982 to 1992 under the "Delta Connection" nameplate. In 1986 American Eagle began scheduling direct commuter flights from Tuscaloosa to Nashville, Tennessee, operated by Air Midwest. That service ended in 1996. The decline demand for commercial passenger flights led the airport to remove itself from the Essential Air Services federal subsidy program in April 1997.

In 2006 the city authorized funding for airline courting, in an effort to revive commercial service to the airport. The city and airport officials believed that the city was in a different economic picture with the Mercedes-Benz US International assembly plant located in the city.

As per Federal Aviation Administration records, the airport had 1,309 commercial passenger boardings (enplanements) in calendar year 2004 and 1,497 enplanements in 2005. The majority of this traffic were athletic charters from the University of Alabama. According to the FAA's National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2007-2011, Tuscaloosa Regional is classified as a general aviation airport.

On August 14, 2016 a fatal plane crash occurred during an attempted emergency landing on Runway 30. Six people who were on their way from Florida to Oxford, Mississippi, died in the incident.

Facilities and aircraft

Tuscaloosa Regional Airport covers an area of 724 acres which contains two asphalt paved runways: 4/22 measuring 6,499 x 150 feet and 11/29 measuring 4,001 x 100 feet. For the 12-month period ending May 31, 2005, the airport had 58,206 aircraft operations, an average of 159 per day: 78% general aviation, 19% military, 2% air taxi and <1% scheduled commercial.

Previous service

Currently, Tuscaloosa Regional does not feature regularly scheduled commercial air service. Throughout its history various carriers served the airport including:

  • Atlantic Southeast Airlines dba Delta Connection, provided daily service between Tuscaloosa and Atlanta between 1982 and June 1992.
  • American Eagle served Tuscaloosa Regional with regular turbo-prop service to its regional hub in Nashville. In December 1995, service was discontinued due to Nashville losing its hub status for American Airlines leaving travelers from Tuscaloosa with few connection options. Due to low ridership, during its final month operating out of Tuscaloosa, all flights were routed through the Birmingham Municipal Airport going to and from Tuscaloosa. Service was then briefly added between Tuscaloosa and Dallas/Fort Worth with an intermediary stop in Jackson, Mississippi. Due to low ridership, the service discontinued on April 18, 1997.
  • GP Express provided service to Atlanta from June 6, 1992, through the elimination of the EAS subsidy for its operation on June 30, 1994.
  • Sunbelt Airlines provided 2 daily flights to Memphis from June 1, 1984 through its elimination of service on September 13, 1984.
  • Southern Airways commenced Tuscaloosa's first service on June 10, 1949, on a 25-seat Douglas DC-3 as one of the original six destinations served by Southern Airways. Service would peak in the mid-1970s with eight daily arrivals and departures to Atlanta, Memphis and New Orleans. Southern merged into Republic Airlines in 1979, and service was discontinued altogether on June 1, 1984.

References

External links

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