Moscow Domodedovo Airport

The airport is named after the town of Domodedovo, on the territory of which it is located.

Survey work on the construction of the new Capital Airport began in 1948, after a decision by the Politburo. It was then described as special "Facility No. 306".

The Domodedovo Airport is on the former territory of a village called Elgazino (Russian: Елгозино). The village's wrecked wooden houses (Izba) at 55°25′7″N 37°51′53″E and cemetery with 19th century tombstones at 55°25′26″N 37°51′51″E remained in the early 21st century, less than a kilometer west of the runway, almost immediately behind the fences. The first mention of Elgazino dates back to the 16th century. In 1550, Tsar Ivan the Terrible gave his voivode and boyar Ivan Vasilyevich Sheremetyev a smaller estate in the Moscow district with 150 quarters of land. In 1627, the village appears again in the records and appears as a village of Elgozino on a pond with five peasant households, in the parish of the Church of the Resurrection in the village of Kolychevo. According to the results of the General Survey of the 1760s, the village already had 25 households and 218 inhabitants. In the 1950s, just before the village was demolished, it had a population of about 200 people.[4]

In 1951, preparatory work on construction began: cutting firebreaks, and construction of access roads, including roads from Paveletskaya.

A 1954 Resolution of the Council of Ministers of 13 November approved the proposal of the Main Directorate of the Civil Air Fleet under the Council of Ministers of the USSR on the construction of the second airport of the Moscow civil air fleet near the village Elgazin Podolsky (now Domodedovo) Moscow Oblast.

In 1958, a decree of the USSR Council of Ministers enabled completion of construction of the first stage of the airport in 1962.

In 1962, an Order of the Head of Main Directorate of Civil Aviation, issued on 7 April No. 200 ("On the organization of the Moscow Domodedovo airport") ordered "organize as part of the Moscow Transport Aviation Management Directorate the new airport, and continue to call it the Moscow Domodedovo Airport". Therefore, 7 April 1962 is considered the official birthday of the airport. By the end of 1962, after the official approbation, the airport began flights by postal and cargo planes.

Domodedovo's terminal as it appeared in June 1974

Domodedovo in July 2016

Services from Domodedovo began in March 1964 with a flight to Sverdlovsk using a Tupolev 104. The airport, intended to handle the growth of long-distance domestic traffic in the Soviet Union, was officially opened in May 1965. A second runway, parallel to the existing one, entered service eighteen months after the opening of the airport. On 26 December 1975, Domodedovo Airport was selected for the inaugural flight of the Tupolev Tu-144 to Alma Ata.

In 1993–1994, East Line Group, founded by Urals entrepreneurs Anton Bakov and Dmitry Kamenschik,[5] who built capital in the early 1990s by hauling cargo from Asian countries to Russia, invested in several facilities at Domodedovo, including a new customs terminal and catering services.[6] In late 1996, Kamenschik-led East Line Group privatized the terminal facilities of Domodedovo Airport and formed JSC 'International Airport Domodedovo' and several other commercial entities controlling the airfield operations at the airport. Since 1998, the runways, air traffic control, and communication facilities have been formally on lease to a subsidiary of East Line Group. Later, in 2005 and 2008, the legality of these deals with East Line Group was contested by the Russian Rosimushchestvo government agency supervising the state property.[7]

East Line's strategic goal to stabilize the airport's future and to establish Domodedovo as an important international and multi-modal transportation hub was gradually achieved throughout the 2000s. In the 2000s, East Line Group began to heavily invest in reconstruction and modernization of the outdated airport facilities.

In 2000, as a result of reconstruction, the capacity of the airport complex reached 6,000 passengers per hour: MVL – 2800 passengers per hour, DAL – 3,200 passengers per hour. As a result of this work Domodedovo airport terminal was the first in Russia to successfully pass the certification to ISO 9001:2000.

In 2003, the authoritative British magazine Airline Business recognized the growth in Domodedovo's passenger traffic as one of the highest among the 150 largest airports in the world. In 2004, the airport was among the hundred leading airports in the world, and by 2005 became the leader in passenger traffic in the Moscow aviation area, a record it held for the next ten years.

By 2009, the terminal floor space was expanded to 135,000 sq. meters (1,453,000 ft²) from 70,000 sq. meters (753,000 ft²) in 2004. The renovated terminal and airport facilities allowed the owners of the airport to attract British Airways, China Eastern Airlines, Lufthansa, Royal Air Maroc, Japan Airlines, Austrian Airlines, and Vietnam Airlines who moved their flights from another major international Moscow airport, Sheremetyevo Airport, to Domodedovo. Domodedovo topped Sheremetyevo Airport in terms of passenger traffic becoming the busiest airport in Russia. By 2010, the traffic at Domodedovo rose to over 22 million passengers per year from 2.8 million in 2000.[8]

Domodedovo is Russia's first airport to have parallel runways operating simultaneously.[9] Since the air traffic control tower was redeveloped in 2003, Domodedovo can control over seventy takeoffs and landings per hour. By late in the first decade of the 21st century, the airport had five business lounges set up by individual airlines.

Current main building

In 2003, the airport began an expansion program designed to obtain approval for wide-body aircraft operations. The runway, taxiways, and parking areas were enlarged and strengthened. In March 2009, it was announced that the approval had been granted, making Domodedovo Airport the first airport in Russia approved for new large aircraft (NLA) operations such as the Airbus A380. The approval signifies that its operations areas comply with size and strength requirements of ICAO Category F standards.[10] The airport has ILS category III A status.

Domodedovo Airport has been the focus of two terrorist-related incidents. In 2004, Muslim suicide bombers managed to pass airport security, board two passenger planes, and carry out the bombings after departure from Domodedovo. Despite the heightened security measures taken after this incident, another suicide bomber attack occurred on 24 January 2011, when an Islamist militant entered the terminal building and detonated a bomb in the arrival hall. As a result, mandatory screening and pat-down practices have been introduced at the airport terminal entrances.

Domodedovo Airport in 2014

The identity of East Line's owners controlling the operations at Domodedovo Airport was vague with traces leading to offshore companies.[11] However, in May 2011, Dmitry Kamenschik was disclosed to be the main beneficiary of East Line's assets.[12] At that time, Domodedovo Airport contemplated an IPO,[13] however these plans were scrapped.[14]

As of January 2016, new concourse extensions adjacent to the current terminal building are under construction. The construction is projected to increase the overall size of the passenger terminal to 225,000 m². The extensions opened in stages in 2012–2014. In May 2015, the new extension of terminal A (the main building) was finished, which contains new offices, an airport lounge and new passport control desks, and its design differs from other terminal parts. All concourses will remain connected and plan to increase the efficiency of the airport operations and passenger connections by using ICAO and IATA transfer technologies. A new parking space was also finished, which can accommodate over 1500 cars.

• Russian Sky Airlines had its head office on the airport property.[50]
• Transaero had its head office at Domodedovo Airport.[51]
• When Domodedovo Airlines existed, its head office was on the airport property.[52]

• On 5 December 1999, a cargo variant of the Ilyushin Il-114 crashed during a test flight at Domodedovo, killing five and injuring two.[53]
• On 24 August 2004, Volga-AviaExpress Flight 1353, and Siberia Airlines Flight 1047 were simultaneously bombed, killing 44 on the first, and 46 on the latter, for a total of 90 people killed in total.
• On 22 March 2010, a Tu-204 operating Aviastar-TU Flight 1906, a ferry flight without passengers and with 8 crew from Hurghada, Egypt, crashed in a forest 2 kilometers (1.2 mi) away from the airport while trying to land in fog. There were no fatalities and the crew escaped the crashed aircraft on their own, but four of them were seriously injured.[54]
• On 4 December 2010, South East Airlines Flight 372 made an emergency landing at Domodedovo, killing two people and injuring 56.[55]
• On 24 January 2011, the Domodedovo International Airport was subject to a suicide bombing which killed 37 people and injured 173. A Chechen jihadist group, the Caucasus Emirate was found to be responsible.
• On 11 February 2018, Saratov Airlines Flight 703, an Antonov 148 crashed shortly after takeoff killing all 71 people on board.

• List of the busiest airports in Russia
• List of the busiest airports in Europe
• List of the busiest airports in the former USSR

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Moscow Domodedovo Airport.

Media related to Domodedovo International Airport at Wikimedia Commons

• Domodedovo International Airport Homepage (in English and Russian)
• Official account on Facebook
• Official account on Instagram
• Aeroexpress service (in English and Russian)
• How to get to/from airport by Aeroexpress train
• Current weather for UUDD at NOAA/NWS
• Accident history for DME at Aviation Safety Network