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60-570: Grant County International Airport ( IATA : MWH , ICAO : KMWH , FAA LID : MWH ) is a public use airport located six miles (10 km) northwest of the central business district of Moses Lake in Grant County, Washington , United States. Formerly a military facility, the airport is owned by the Port of Moses Lake, and its 13,500-foot (4,110 m) runway is the 17th longest in the U.S. According to Federal Aviation Administration records,

120-399: A Convair 880 , crashed on take-off from runway 32R at Grant County International Airport. The power was reduced on the number four engine during take-off, however, the aircraft continued to yaw to the right until the number four engine struck and slid off the runway. It burst into flames, killing three of the five crew members on board. The probable cause was a "delayed corrective action during

180-670: A 13,500-foot (4,110 m) main runway, it is one of the largest airports in the United States. Moses Lake is famous for good flying weather, as it is located on the east side of the Cascade Range , in the semi-arid desert of central Washington . Grant County International Airport was an alternate landing site for the NASA Space Shuttle . Scheduled passenger flights on Big Sky Airlines to Boise and Portland were discontinued on September 1, 2006. The service

240-409: A defined barometric pressure . Generally, the pressure used to set the altimeter is the barometric pressure that would exist at MSL in the region being flown over. This pressure is referred to as either QNH or "altimeter" and is transmitted to the pilot by radio from air traffic control (ATC) or an automatic terminal information service (ATIS). Since the terrain elevation is also referenced to MSL,

300-432: A few metres, in timeframes ranging from minutes to months: Between 1901 and 2018, the average sea level rose by 15–25 cm (6–10 in), with an increase of 2.3 mm (0.091 in) per year since the 1970s. This was faster than the sea level had ever risen over at least the past 3,000 years. The rate accelerated to 4.62 mm (0.182 in)/yr for the decade 2013–2022. Climate change due to human activities

360-567: 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

420-438: A reference datum for mean sea level (MSL). It is also used in aviation, where some heights are recorded and reported with respect to mean sea level (contrast with flight level ), and in the atmospheric sciences , and in land surveying . An alternative is to base height measurements on a reference ellipsoid approximating the entire Earth, which is what systems such as GPS do. In aviation, the reference ellipsoid known as WGS84

480-407: A sharp reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, this may increase to hundreds of millions in the latter decades of the century. Local factors like tidal range or land subsidence will greatly affect the severity of impacts. For instance, sea level rise in the United States is likely to be two to three times greater than the global average by the end of the century. Yet, of the 20 countries with

540-583: A simulated critical-engine-out takeoff maneuver resulting in an excessive sideslip from which full recovery could not be effected." In September 2019, Boeing stored 100 of its undelivered 737 MAX airplanes at the Moses Lake airport while it awaited clearance from the FAA and other aviation regulators to return the jet to commercial service. Passenger air service to and from Moses Lake ended on 8 June 2010. With 4,650 acres (7.3 sq mi; 18.8 km) and

600-509: Is GSN and its IATA code is SPN, and some coincide with IATA codes of non-U.S. airports. 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

660-417: Is an average surface level of one or more among Earth 's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datum  – a standardised geodetic datum  – that is used, for example, as a chart datum in cartography and marine navigation , or, in aviation, as the standard sea level at which atmospheric pressure

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720-554: Is available. However, many railway administrations have their own list of codes for their stations, such as the list of Amtrak station codes . Airport codes arose out of the convenience that the practice brought pilots for location identification in the 1930s. Initially, pilots in the United States used the two-letter code from the National Weather Service (NWS) for identifying cities. This system became unmanageable for cities and towns without an NWS identifier, and

780-488: Is because the sea is in constant motion, affected by the tides, wind , atmospheric pressure, local gravitational differences, temperature, salinity , and so forth. The mean sea level at a particular location may be calculated over an extended time period and used as a datum . For example, hourly measurements may be averaged over a full Metonic 19-year lunar cycle to determine the mean sea level at an official tide gauge . Still-water level or still-water sea level (SWL)

840-523: Is different from the name in English, yet the airport code represents only the English name. Examples include: Due to scarcity of codes, some airports are given codes with letters not found in their names: The use of 'X' as a filler letter is a practice to create three-letter identifiers when more straightforward options were unavailable: Some airports in the United States retained their NWS ( National Weather Service ) codes and simply appended an X at

900-427: Is due to change in either the volume of water in the world's oceans or the volume of the oceanic basins . Two major mechanisms are currently causing eustatic sea level rise. First, shrinking land ice, such as mountain glaciers and polar ice sheets, is releasing water into the oceans. Second, as ocean temperatures rise, the warmer water expands. Many factors can produce short-term changes in sea level, typically within

960-671: Is governed by IATA Resolution 763, and it is administered by the IATA's headquarters in Montreal , Canada. The codes are published semi-annually in the IATA Airline Coding Directory. IATA provides codes for airport handling entities, and for certain railway stations. Alphabetical lists of airports sorted by IATA code are available. A list of railway station codes , shared in agreements between airlines and rail lines such as Amtrak , SNCF , and Deutsche Bahn ,

1020-513: 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." Thus, Washington, D.C. area's three airports all have radically different codes: IAD for Washington–Dulles , DCA for Washington–Reagan (District of Columbia Airport), and BWI for Baltimore (Baltimore–Washington International, formerly BAL). Since HOU

1080-483: Is increasingly used to define heights; however, differences up to 100 metres (328 feet) exist between this ellipsoid height and local mean sea level. Another alternative is to use a geoid -based vertical datum such as NAVD88 and the global EGM96 (part of WGS84). Details vary in different countries. When referring to geographic features such as mountains, on a topographic map variations in elevation are shown by contour lines . A mountain's highest point or summit

1140-512: Is measured to calibrate altitude and, consequently, aircraft flight levels . A common and relatively straightforward mean sea-level standard is instead a long-term average of tide gauge readings at a particular reference location. Sea levels can be affected by many factors and are known to have varied greatly over geological time scales . Current sea level rise is mainly caused by human-induced climate change . When temperatures rise, mountain glaciers and polar ice sheets melt, increasing

1200-543: Is not followed outside the United States: In addition, since three letter codes starting with Q are widely used in radio communication, cities whose name begins with "Q" also had to find alternate codes, as in the case of: IATA codes should not be confused with the FAA identifiers of U.S. airports. Most FAA identifiers agree with the corresponding IATA codes, but some do not, such as Saipan , whose FAA identifier

1260-450: Is the level of the sea with motions such as wind waves averaged out. Then MSL implies the SWL further averaged over a period of time such that changes due to, e.g., the tides , also have zero mean. Global MSL refers to a spatial average over the entire ocean area, typically using large sets of tide gauges and/or satellite measurements. One often measures the values of MSL with respect to

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1320-727: Is the main cause. Between 1993 and 2018, melting ice sheets and glaciers accounted for 44% of sea level rise , with another 42% resulting from thermal expansion of water . Sea level rise lags behind changes in the Earth 's temperature by many decades, and sea level rise will therefore continue to accelerate between now and 2050 in response to warming that has already happened. What happens after that depends on human greenhouse gas emissions . If there are very deep cuts in emissions, sea level rise would slow between 2050 and 2100. It could then reach by 2100 slightly over 30 cm (1 ft) from now and approximately 60 cm (2 ft) from

1380-531: Is typically illustrated with the AMSL height in metres, feet or both. In unusual cases where a land location is below sea level, such as Death Valley, California , the elevation AMSL is negative. It is often necessary to compare the local height of the mean sea surface with a "level" reference surface, or geodetic datum, called the geoid . In the absence of external forces, the local mean sea level would coincide with this geoid surface, being an equipotential surface of

1440-416: Is used for William P. Hobby Airport , the new Houston–Intercontinental became IAH. The code BKK was originally assigned to Bangkok–Don Mueang and was later transferred to Suvarnabhumi Airport , while the former adopted DMK. The code ISK was originally assigned to Gandhinagar Airport (Nashik's old airport) and later on transferred to Ozar Airport (Nashik's current airport). Shanghai–Hongqiao retained

1500-571: The Canadian transcontinental railroads were built, each station was assigned its own two-letter Morse code : 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

1560-690: The Mitsubishi SpaceJet . In November 1974, the airport hosted a new Supersonic Transport (SST) Concorde for a month during FAA certification testing. It is also utilized by the U.S. Air Force and Boeing as a testing facility. Most of the traffic at the airport is general and military aviation. In 2011, the 92nd Air Refueling Wing at Fairchild AFB in Spokane temporarily moved its KC-135 R/T fleet and operations to Moses Lake while Fairchild's runway underwent reconstruction and other infrastructure improvements, to include an upgrade to

1620-622: The geoid of the Earth, which approximates the local mean sea level for locations in the open ocean. The geoid includes a significant depression in the Indian Ocean , whose surface dips as much as 106 m (348 ft) below the global mean sea level (excluding minor effects such as tides and currents). Precise determination of a "mean sea level" is difficult because of the many factors that affect sea level. Instantaneous sea level varies substantially on several scales of time and space. This

1680-418: The height above mean sea level (AMSL). The term APSL means above present sea level, comparing sea levels in the past with the level today. Earth's radius at sea level is 6,378.137 km (3,963.191 mi) at the equator. It is 6,356.752 km (3,949.903 mi) at the poles and 6,371.001 km (3,958.756 mi) on average. This flattened spheroid , combined with local gravity anomalies , defines

1740-399: The 12-month period ending December 31, 2018, the airport had 77,335 aircraft operations, an average of 212 per day: 61% general aviation , 15% military , 10% air carrier and 14% air taxi . At that time there were 49 fixed-wing aircraft and 2 gliders based at this airport: 84% single- engine , 12% multi-engine, and 4% glider. IATA airport code The assignment of these codes

1800-562: The 1690s. Satellite altimeters have been making precise measurements of sea level since the launch of TOPEX/Poseidon in 1992. A joint mission of NASA and CNES , TOPEX/Poseidon was followed by Jason-1 in 2001 and the Ocean Surface Topography Mission on the Jason-2 satellite in 2008. Height above mean sea level ( AMSL ) is the elevation (on the ground) or altitude (in the air) of an object, relative to

1860-973: The 19th century. With high emissions it would instead accelerate further, and could rise by 1.0 m ( 3 + 1 ⁄ 3  ft) or even 1.6 m ( 5 + 1 ⁄ 3  ft) by 2100. In the long run, sea level rise would amount to 2–3 m (7–10 ft) over the next 2000 years if warming stays to its current 1.5 °C (2.7 °F) over the pre-industrial past. It would be 19–22 metres (62–72 ft) if warming peaks at 5 °C (9.0 °F). Rising seas affect every coastal and island population on Earth. This can be through flooding, higher storm surges , king tides , and tsunamis . There are many knock-on effects. They lead to loss of coastal ecosystems like mangroves . Crop yields may reduce because of increasing salt levels in irrigation water. Damage to ports disrupts sea trade. The sea level rise projected by 2050 will expose places currently inhabited by tens of millions of people to annual flooding. Without

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1920-448: The Earth's gravitational field which, in itself, does not conform to a simple sphere or ellipsoid and exhibits gravity anomalies such as those measured by NASA's GRACE satellites . In reality, the geoid surface is not directly observed, even as a long-term average, due to ocean currents, air pressure variations, temperature and salinity variations, etc. The location-dependent but time-persistent separation between local mean sea level and

1980-705: The Marégraphe in Marseilles measures continuously the sea level since 1883 and offers the longest collated data about the sea level. It is used for a part of continental Europe and the main part of Africa as the official sea level. Spain uses the reference to measure heights below or above sea level at Alicante , while the European Vertical Reference System is calibrated to the Amsterdam Peil elevation, which dates back to

2040-487: The U.S. For example, several airports in Alaska have scheduled commercial service, such as Stebbins and Nanwalek , which use FAA codes instead of ICAO codes. Thus, neither system completely includes all airports with scheduled service. Some airports are identified in colloquial speech by their IATA code. Examples include LAX and JFK . Sea level#AMSL Mean sea level ( MSL , often shortened to sea level )

2100-481: 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 (for example, YOW for O tta w a , YWG for W innipe g , YYC for C algar y , or YVR for V ancouve r ), whereas other Canadian airports append

2160-522: The airport had 1,369 passenger boardings (enplanements) in calendar year 2008, 2,920 enplanements in 2009, and 1,442 in 2010. It is included in the National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2011–2015, which categorized it as a general aviation airport. Opened as a training airfield during World War II , the facility was operated by the U.S. Air Force as Larson Air Force Base until 1966. On 24 June 1969, Japan Airlines Flight 90,

2220-440: The airport itself instead of the city it serves, while another code is reserved which refers to the city itself which can be used to search for flights to any of its airports. For instance: Or using a code for the city in one of the major airports and then assigning another code to another airport: When different cities with the same name each have an airport, they need to be assigned different codes. Examples include: Sometimes,

2280-418: The airport's former name, such as Orlando International Airport 's MCO (for Mc C o y Air Force Base), or Chicago's O'Hare International Airport , which is coded ORD for its original name: Or char d Field. In rare cases, the code comes from the airport's unofficial name, such as Kahului Airport 's OGG (for local aviation pioneer Jimmy H ogg ). In large metropolitan areas, airport codes are often named after

2340-456: The amount of water in the oceans, while the existing seawater also expands with heat. Because most of human settlement and infrastructure was built in response to a more-normalized sea level with limited expected change, populations affected by sea level rise will need to invest in climate adaptation to mitigate the worst effects or, when populations are at extreme risk, a process of managed retreat . The term above sea level generally refers to

2400-628: The base's aviation fuel distribution system. The main campus for Big Bend Community College is also located on the grounds of the airport. After the grounding of all Boeing 737 MAXs from March 2019, approximately 50 of the grounded airplanes were parked at the airport. This was originally seen as an economic opportunity for the airport, but later caused concern as the number of planes stored kept increasing, to approximately 130 by October 2019. Grant Co. International Airport covers an area of 4,650 acres (1,880 ha) at an elevation of 1,189 feet (362 m) above sea level . It has five runways : For

2460-502: The code SHA, while the newer Shanghai–Pudong adopted PVG. The opposite was true for Berlin : the airport Berlin–Tegel used the code TXL, while its smaller counterpart Berlin–Schönefeld used SXF; the Berlin Brandenburg Airport has the airport code BER, which is also part of its branding. The airports of Hamburg (HAM) and Hannover (HAJ) are less than 100 nautical miles (190 km) apart and therefore share

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2520-934: The end. Examples include: A lot of minor airfields without scheduled passenger traffic have ICAO codes but not IATA codes, since the four letter codes allow more number of codes, and IATA codes are mainly used for passenger services such as tickets, and ICAO codes by pilots. In the US, such airfields use FAA codes instead of ICAO. There are airports with scheduled service for which there are ICAO codes but not IATA codes, such as Nkhotakota Airport/Tangole Airport in Malawi or Chōfu Airport in Tokyo, Japan. There are also several minor airports in Russia (e.g., Omsukchan Airport ) which lack IATA codes and instead use internal Russian codes for booking. Flights to these airports cannot be booked through

2580-557: The first three letters of the city in which it is located, for instance: The code may also be a combination of the letters in its name, such as: Sometimes the airport code reflects pronunciation, rather than spelling, namely: For many reasons, some airport codes do not fit the normal scheme described above. Some airports, for example, cross several municipalities or regions, and therefore, use codes derived from some of their letters, resulting in: Other airports—particularly those serving cities with multiple airports—have codes derived from

2640-478: The following format: 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

2700-597: 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). Numerous New Zealand airports use codes that contain the letter Z, to distinguish them from similar airport names in other countries. Examples include HLZ for Hamilton , ZQN for Queenstown , and WSZ for Westport . Predominantly, airport codes are named after

2760-482: The geoid is referred to as (mean) ocean surface topography . It varies globally in a typical range of ±1 m (3 ft). Several terms are used to describe the changing relationships between sea level and dry land. The melting of glaciers at the end of ice ages results in isostatic post-glacial rebound , when land rises after the weight of ice is removed. Conversely, older volcanic islands experience relative sea level rise, due to isostatic subsidence from

2820-634: The greatest exposure to sea level rise, twelve are in Asia , including Indonesia , Bangladesh and the Philippines. The resilience and adaptive capacity of ecosystems and countries also varies, which will result in more or less pronounced impacts. The greatest impact on human populations in the near term will occur in the low-lying Caribbean and Pacific islands . Sea level rise will make many of them uninhabitable later this century. Pilots can estimate height above sea level with an altimeter set to

2880-555: The height of planetary features. Local mean sea level (LMSL) is defined as the height of the sea with respect to a land benchmark, averaged over a period of time long enough that fluctuations caused by waves and tides are smoothed out, typically a year or more. One must adjust perceived changes in LMSL to account for vertical movements of the land, which can occur at rates similar to sea level changes (millimetres per year). Some land movements occur because of isostatic adjustment to

2940-487: The international air booking systems or have international luggage transferred there, and thus, they are booked instead through the airline or a domestic booking system. Several heliports in Greenland have 3-letter codes used internally which might be IATA codes for airports in faraway countries. There are several airports with scheduled service that have not been assigned ICAO codes that do have IATA codes, especially in

3000-591: The land; hence a change in relative MSL or ( relative sea level ) can result from a real change in sea level, or from a change in the height of the land on which the tide gauge operates, or both. In the UK, the ordnance datum (the 0 metres height on UK maps) is the mean sea level measured at Newlyn in Cornwall between 1915 and 1921. Before 1921, the vertical datum was MSL at the Victoria Dock, Liverpool . Since

3060-481: The melting of ice sheets at the end of the last ice age . The weight of the ice sheet depresses the underlying land, and when the ice melts away the land slowly rebounds . Changes in ground-based ice volume also affect local and regional sea levels by the readjustment of the geoid and true polar wander . Atmospheric pressure , ocean currents and local ocean temperature changes can affect LMSL as well. Eustatic sea level change (global as opposed to local change)

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3120-612: The name of the airport itself, for instance: This is also true with some cities with a single airport (even if there is more than one airport in the metropolitan area of said city), such as BDL for Hartford, Connecticut 's B ra dl ey International Airport or Baltimore's BWI, for B altimore/ W ashington I nternational Airport ; however, the latter also serves Washington, D.C. , alongside Dulles International Airport (IAD, for I nternational A irport D ulles) and Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA, for D istrict of C olumbia A irport). The code also sometimes comes from

3180-416: The one they are located in: Other airport codes are of obscure origin, and each has its own peculiarities: In Asia, codes that do not correspond with their city's names include Niigata 's KIJ , Nanchang 's KHN and Pyongyang 's FNJ . EuroAirport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg , which serves three countries, has three airport codes: BSL, MLH, EAP. Some cities have a name in their respective language which

3240-506: The same first and middle letters, indicating that this rule might be followed only in Germany. Many cities retain historical names in their airport codes, even after having undergone an official name/spelling/transliteration change: Some airport codes are based on previous names associated with a present airport, often with a military heritage. These include: Some airports are named for an administrative division or nearby city, rather than

3300-500: 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 , now the location of Montréal–Trudeau). 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

3360-466: The times of the Russian Empire , in Russia and its other former parts, now independent states, the sea level is measured from the zero level of Kronstadt Sea-Gauge. In Hong Kong, "mPD" is a surveying term meaning "metres above Principal Datum" and refers to height of 0.146 m (5.7 in) above chart datum and 1.304 m (4 ft 3.3 in) below the average sea level. In France,

3420-515: 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: Canada's largest airport is YYZ for Toronto Pearson (as YTZ was already allocated to Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport , the airport was given

3480-529: The use of two letters allowed only a few hundred combinations; a three-letter system of airport codes was implemented. This system allowed for 17,576 permutations, assuming all letters can be used in conjunction with each other. Since the U.S. 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: This practice

3540-411: The weight of cooling volcanos. The subsidence of land due to the withdrawal of groundwater is another isostatic cause of relative sea level rise. On planets that lack a liquid ocean, planetologists can calculate a "mean altitude" by averaging the heights of all points on the surface. This altitude, sometimes referred to as a "sea level" or zero-level elevation , serves equivalently as a reference for

3600-565: Was subsidized by the Essential Air Service program. United Express, operated by SkyWest Airlines offered nonstop flights to Seattle from June 2009 until June 2010. The airport currently has no commercial passenger air service. The airport was used for heavy jet training by Japan Airlines (JAL) for over forty years, until the closing of their training offices in March 2009. The airport also had been used for flight testing of

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