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55-673: St. Pete–Clearwater International Airport ( IATA : PIE , ICAO : KPIE , FAA LID : PIE ) is a public/military airport in Pinellas County, Florida , United States, serving the Tampa Bay Area . It is right on the northeast municipal boundary of Pinellas Park , 9 miles (14 km) north of downtown St. Petersburg , 7 miles (11 km) southeast of Clearwater , and 17 miles (27 km) southwest of Tampa . The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2023–2027 categorized it as

110-446: A Lockheed L-1049G Super Constellation to Pittsburgh. In 1956, Mackey Airlines Douglas DC-4s flew to Nassau, Bahamas , via Tampa and Fort Lauderdale. In 1959, a National Airlines Douglas DC-7B flew to New York City Idlewild Airport (now JFK Airport ) and Boston via Jacksonville. In 1960, Delta was operating "Flying Scot" Douglas DC-6s on a St. Petersburg - Atlanta - Knoxville - Cincinnati - Chicago Midway Airport routing. With

165-455: A Canadian-based scheduled and charter airline, was operating wide body Lockheed L-1011 TriStar jets on its flights into the airport. In the late spring of 2004, Southeast Airlines was operating nonstop McDonnell Douglas DC-9-30 jet service from the airport to Allentown, PA (ABE), Columbus, OH (LCK), Gary, IN (GYY), and Newburgh, NY (SWF). Southeast Airlines went out of business in the fall of 2004, while Air South had previously ceased serving

220-528: A decade after the pioneer flight of the Wright brothers at Kitty Hawk in 1903, the first tickets for airline travel were sold by the St. Petersburg-Tampa Airboat Line of Tony Jannus to fare-paying passengers. Using a Benoist XIV amphibious aircraft , the inaugural flight took place from a location near the downtown St. Petersburg Pier . Mayor Abram C. Pheil of St. Petersburg and Mae Peabody of Dubuque, Iowa, were

275-494: A military flight training base assigned to Third Air Force . The 304th Fighter Squadron, a combat training unit of the 337th Fighter Group based P-40 Warhawks and, later, P-51 Mustangs at Pinellas Army Airfield (as it was then known) for the duration of World War II . Antisubmarine patrols against German U-boats in the Gulf of Mexico were also flown from the airfield. To commemorate the airport's vital role during that conflict,

330-567: 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

385-748: A plaque at the airport terminal baggage claim area. Another replica is displayed at the St. Petersburg Museum of History adjacent to the Pier. Since 1991, the terminal holds the archives of the Florida Aviation Historical Society. Construction of the airport at its present site started in March 1941. After the attack on Pearl Harbor , the airport was acquired by the United States Army Air Forces , which used it as

440-605: A plaque was dedicated at the airport terminal in 1994 by the P-51 Fighter Pilots Association and Brigadier General James H. Howard , who was the only European Theater fighter pilot to be awarded the Medal of Honor in World War II and later served as the last wartime base commander of Pinellas Army Airfield. A permanent exhibit honoring General Howard is located in the terminal. After World War II,

495-432: A small-hub primary commercial service facility. In 2014, it showed double-digit growth and handled more than one million passengers, setting a record. Most scheduled airline traffic in the Tampa Bay Area uses Tampa International Airport (TPA), 10 miles (16 km) east, but St. Pete–Clearwater remains a destination for low-cost carriers. St. Pete–Clearwater is a focus city for Las Vegas–based Allegiant Air . The airport

550-623: Is 6,000 by 150 feet (1,829 x 46 m). The airport is also the home of Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater , the largest and busiest U.S. Coast Guard Air Station in the United States, operating HC-130 Hercules and MH-60T Jayhawk aircraft. The U.S. Army Reserve also maintains an Army Aviation Support Facility (AASF) at PIE immediately west of the approach end of Runway 17R for Companies A and F, 5th Battalion, 159th Aviation Regiment and Medical Evacuation Unit, operating UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters. U.S. Customs and Border Protection ,

605-509: 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

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660-408: Is also less busy than Tampa and is frequently used by pilots of private planes and executive jets. The airport uses "Tampa Bay The Easy Way" as an advertising slogan and "Fly2PIE" in reference to its three-letter IATA and FAA codes. The airport is on the west shoreline of Tampa Bay , six miles (10 km) north of St. Petersburg, Florida (the "birthplace of commercial air transportation"). Barely

715-554: 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

770-523: 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

825-513: 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

880-543: 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

935-416: 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

990-571: 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

1045-636: The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)-operated control tower, the FAA's Central Florida Region Automated Flight Service Station (AFSS) (which is the busiest AFSS in the United States) and the St. Petersburg VORTAC for airways navigation are also important federal government services at the airport. The entire tract of the airport is designated as a Foreign Trade Zone (FTZ) and a large Airport Industrial Park developed in

1100-466: The 1980s is a major center of commerce. The airport and its tenants employ over 3,000 people and have an economic benefit of more than $ 400 million yearly to the Tampa Bay area. The airport has a 24-hour airport rescue and fire-fighting ( ARFF ) department (Index C), along with operations, facilities, engineering, security, and administrative personnel. For the year ending December 31, 2021,

1155-474: The 1990s. In the fall of 1991, American Trans Air was the only airline serving the airport with just three nonstop Boeing 727 flights a week from Indianapolis. By early 1994, ATA was operating nonstop Boeing 757-200s from Chicago Midway Airport , nonstop Boeing 727-200s from Indianapolis, nonstop Boeing 727-200s from Milwaukee and weekly nonstop wide body Lockheed L-1011 TriStars from Philadelphia. By late 1994, American Trans Air had expanded its service and

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1210-816: The Tampa Bay area at TPA in the early 1960s. In 1963, Northwest was flying Lockheed L-188 Electra propjet service Miami–Fort Lauderdale–St. Petersburg–Atlanta– Chicago O'Hare –Minneapolis/St. Paul–Fargo, ND–Grand Forks, ND– Winnipeg , Canada. Eastern was the last scheduled airline at PIE during the mid-1960s and it ended flights from the airport in 1964. The year before, Eastern had been operating prop flights from St. Petersburg nonstop to Charlotte, Chicago O'Hare Airport, Cleveland and Louisville as well as direct one-stop service to Columbus, OH, Detroit and Indianapolis. Scheduled air service returned to PIE in 1972, when Air Florida began intrastate airline flights to Miami and Orlando with Boeing 707s . Air Florida replaced its 707s with Lockheed L-188 Electras out of PIE, and in 1974

1265-854: The Ticketing A lobby and gate 12 exiting into the baggage claim. IATA airport code The assignment of these codes 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 ,

1320-513: 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 . General Wayne A. Downing Peoria International Airport Too Many Requests If you report this error to

1375-481: 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

1430-549: The advent of the jet age , runway 17/35 was extended north into Tampa Bay; the first scheduled jets were Northwest Airlines Boeing 720Bs from Chicago in late 1961 (the 1961 Aviation Week directory says PIE's longest runways were 5,700 feet, but it appears 17/35 was 8,000 feet when the 720B arrived). The increased capacities of Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8 jets prompted the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) to approve consolidation of airline service for

1485-1434: The airport back in 1996, and subsequently went out of business as well. According to the Official Airline Guide (OAG), five airlines were operating jet service into the airport in the spring of 2005 including two U.S.-based air carriers and three Canadian-based air carriers with ATA Airlines (formerly American Trans Air) operating Boeing 757-200 as well as Boeing 757-300 nonstop flights from Chicago Midway Airport (MDW) and Indianapolis (IND), CanJet operating nonstop Boeing 737-500 flights from Halifax, Nova Scotia (YHZ) and Hamilton, Ontario (YHM), Jetsgo operating Fokker 100 as well as McDonnell Douglas MD-83 nonstop flights from Toronto (YYZ), Skyservice Airlines operating nonstop Airbus A320 flights also from Toronto (YYZ), and USA 3000 Airlines operating nonstop Airbus A320 flights from Chicago O'Hare Airport (ORD), Cleveland (CLE), Detroit (DTW), New York Newark Airport (EWR), Philadelphia (PHL), Pittsburgh (PIT) and St. Louis (STL). In September 2006, Allegiant Air announced scheduled service from St. Petersburg–Clearwater to cities in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. Allegiant's destination count from PIE has since increased to 59 airports in

1540-461: The airport had 146,494 aircraft operations, an average of 401 operations per day; with 78% general aviation , 10% commercial , 6% air taxi , and 6% military . At the time, there were 193 aircraft based at this airport: 85 single-engine, 31 multi-engine, 57 jet, 3 helicopter , and 17 military. Aside from the year of the COVID-19 pandemic, St. Petersburg–Clearwater International Airport serves as

1595-440: 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,

1650-418: 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

1705-520: The animals they were flying south. During the 1950s until the mid 1960s, several major U.S. airlines served both St. Petersburg–Clearwater (PIE) and Tampa International Airport (TPA), including Delta Air Lines , Eastern Air Lines , National Airlines and Northwest Airlines . The April 1957 Official Airline Guide lists 17 airline departures from PIE: ten by Eastern, six by National and one by Mackey Airlines . Four departures flew nonstop beyond Florida, including an Eastern Douglas DC-4 to Chicago and

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1760-668: The base for the Honor Flight of West Central Florida. American Veterans partake in a flight to Washington D.C. annually to visit memorials dedicated to individuals who fought for the United States in various wars. About 75 to 80 veterans participate in the program annually which is designed to fly older veterans who typically could not visit Washington, D.C., otherwise. St. Petersburg–Clearwater International Airport has one terminal with two gate areas, known as A-Side & B-Side. A-Side has gates 1-6 and B-Side has gates 7-12. Gates 1 & 12 are Arrivals Only gates, with gate 1 exiting into

1815-502: 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

1870-478: The eastern United States. In February, the Lansing, Michigan service shifted to Grand Rapids, Michigan , with four weekly flights. Allegiant operates Airbus A319 and A320 jets on its flights from the airport. In 2009, the airport completed a US$ 22 million renovation, including, among other things, larger gates, new plumbing, and building passenger jet bridges . In January 2015, Silver Airways announced it

1925-934: 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

1980-465: The first passengers, flying across the bay to Tampa and, according to a United Press account, reportedly reaching the maximum speed of 75 miles per hour (121 km/h) during the flight. Other reports indicate that they reached an altitude of 50 feet (15 m). This was the beginning of commercial air transportation anywhere in the world and is commemorated by a replica of the Benoist aircraft and

2035-557: 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

2090-478: 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

2145-597: 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

2200-487: 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

2255-612: 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

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2310-416: 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

2365-472: The property was returned to Pinellas County by the U.S. government to operate as a civil airport. It was originally called Pinellas International Airport and given the IATA designation, PIE, which it still uses, because PIA was already taken by Peoria International Airport . In 1958, the name was changed to St. Petersburg–Clearwater International Airport because, according to airport manager "Bobo" Hayes, tourists didn't know where Pinellas County was. The airport

2420-506: 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

2475-500: 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

2530-402: The summer of 1995, Air South was flying nonstop Boeing 737-200 jet service to Atlanta, Columbia, SC, Miami and Tallahassee. The Air South service to Miami in 1995 included up to five 737 nonstops on weekdays while at the same time commuter air carrier Gulfstream International Airlines was operating twice daily nonstop flights to Miami with small Beechcraft 1900C turboprops. In 1997, Reno Air

2585-515: 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

2640-529: 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

2695-461: Was beginning service to PIE, but in March the company had cancelled its plans. As of 2021, the airport is planning to convert decommissioned runway 9/27 into a taxiway to enhance service for air carriers, the U.S. Coast Guard, and Pinellas County Sheriff's Office aircraft. The airport covers 1900 acres (769 ha ) at an elevation of 11 feet (3 m). It has two asphalt runways : 18/36 is 9,730 by 150 feet (2,966 x 46 m) with an ILS approach, and 04/22

2750-415: Was flying Boeing 727-100 nonstop flights to Fort Lauderdale and New Orleans, in addition to its nonstop service to Islip. Also in 1983, People Express was flying nonstop to New York/Newark Liberty International Airport with Boeing 727-200s , 737-100s and 737-200s . Locally based regional air carrier Atlantic Gulf Airlines was flying Vickers Viscount turboprops nonstop to Miami in 1983, and by 1984

2805-988: Was flying nonstop to Miami, Orlando and Tallahassee. According to the Official Airline Guide (OAG), only one airline was serving St. Petersburg in the fall of 1979: regional air carrier Red Carpet Airlines operating Convair 440 prop aircraft five days a week nonstop from Miami and two days a week nonstop from Grand Cayman in the Caribbean. According to the OAG, by 1981 the airport still had only one air carrier operating scheduled passenger service: commuter airline Sun Air operating small Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante turboprops with one weekday nonstop flight from Miami as well as one weekday nonstop flight from nearby Tampa. Jet service returned in 1982 with Northeastern International Airways flying Douglas DC-8 nonstop flights to Long Island MacArthur Airport in Islip, New York. By 1983, Northeastern

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2860-1161: Was operating Convair 580 turboprops to Atlanta, Fort Lauderdale, Miami and Tallahassee. By 1984, Northeastern had added nonstop West Palm Beach jet flights as well as direct jet flights to Hartford/Springfield, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Little Rock, Oklahoma City, San Diego and Tulsa. People Express then expanded its flights from the airport, and in 1985 was flying nonstop to Charlotte and New York/Newark as well as operating direct, no change of plane jet service to Boston, Detroit and Syracuse. Also in 1985, Florida Express British Aircraft Corporation BAC One-Eleven jets were serving PIE with four daily nonstops to its Orlando hub with direct flights to Columbus, OH, Fort Lauderdale, Indianapolis and Nashville via Orlando. In 1987, American Airlines initiated nonstop mainline jet flights to its Raleigh-Durham hub while Midway Airlines (1976-1991) commenced nonstop Boeing 737-200 jet flights in 1988 from its Chicago Midway Airport hub with direct one stop service from Cleveland ; however, by October 1989 PIE once again had no scheduled airline service. American Trans Air (ATA) and Air South began jet flights from PIE in

2915-467: Was operating "Gulf Coast Flyer" service nonstop to Gulfport/Biloxi with McDonnell Douglas MD-80s . By 1999, the OAG listed four airlines operating jets to St. Petersburg: American Trans Air Boeing 727-200 nonstops from Chicago Midway Airport and Indianapolis, Canada 3000 Airbus A320 nonstops from Toronto , Nations Air Boeing 737-200 nonstops from Gulfport/Biloxi and Royal Aviation Boeing 757-200 nonstops from Toronto. Also in 1999, Air Transat ,

2970-430: Was operating domestic nonstop service to Fort Lauderdale and St. Louis as well as international nonstop flights to Nassau, Bahamas , in addition to its flights to Chicago Midway, Indianapolis and Milwaukee. ATA was primarily operating Boeing 727-200 jets on these services in late 1994 but was also operating larger Boeing 757-200 jetliners on some nonstop flights between the airport and Chicago Midway at this time as well. In

3025-490: Was the original home to two of the first scheduled air freight airlines in the United States, U. S. Airlines (dating to 1946) and Aerovias Sud Americana (1947), which was also known as ASA International Airlines. U. S. Airlines had domestic routes to the northern cities, whereas ASA had routes to Latin America. One of ASA's specialities was flying livestock, and consequently the airport had animal pens to allow ASA to assemble

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