Floating Airport

Presented by

Abhishek Mondal (12NA30002)

Department of Ocean Engineering & Naval Architecture

IIT Kharagpur

Floating Airport

• Built and situated on a very large floating structure (VLFS).

• The first discussion in 1930 for trans-Atlantic passenger flights.

• Increasing population and expensive land necessitate it to save economy.

• Diminish pollution, aircraft noise and reduce risks of aircraft crashes to the land-locked population

Kansai International Airport, Japan

An international airport located on an artificial island in the middle of Osaka Bay, 38 km southwest of Ōsaka Station, located within three municipalities including Izumisano (north), Sennan (south) & Tajiri (center) in Osaka Prefecture, Japan.

The airport serves as an international hub for All Nippon Airways, Japan Airlines, Nippon Cargo Airlines and also serves as a hub for Peach, the first international low-cost carrier in Japan.

Kansai International Airport (KIX)

History

• In the 1960s, when the Kansai region was rapidly losing trade to Tokyo, planners proposed a new airport near Kobe and Osaka. Osaka International Airport was surrounded by buildings, so could not be expanded and many of its neighbors had filed complaints because of noise pollution problems.

• Planners decided to build the airport offshore. The new airport was part of a number of new developments to revitalize Osaka, which had lost economic and cultural ground to Tokyo for most of the century.

• Initially, the airport was planned to be built near Kobe, but the city of Kobe refused the plan, so the airport was moved to a more southerly location on Osaka Bay. There, it could be open 24 hours per day, unlike its predecessor in the city.

Key Features

Located on a biggest artificial (man-made) island (4 X 2.5 km )in Osaka Bay in Japan.

Designed overcome the extremely high risks of earthquakes, typhoons & storm surges of up to 3 m (10 ft.)

Construction started in 1987. The sea wall was finished in 1989.

Opened for flights in September 1994

Construction cost is over $20 billion

On 19 April 2001 the ASCE (American Society of Civil Engineers) named KIA the 2nd ranked (after Panama Canal) civil engineering project of the 20th century.

Airport Layout

Construction of KIX

Stage Activity Time

I Subsurface Investigation 1 year

II Sea Wall Construction 2 years

III Landfilling 4 years

IV Terminal Construction 2 years

Construction of KIX

• KIX consists of 2 runways (A and B) & 2 terminals

• The sea wall was made of rock and 48,000 concrete blocks

• 10,000 workers and 10 million work hours and 80 ships were required to complete the 30 meter layer of earth over the sea floor.

• It’s the most expensive civil works project in modern history after twenty years of planning, three years of construction and several billion dollars of investment.

• Terminal construction commenced in 1991 & the Airport opened in 1994.

Construction of KIX

Sea Wall

Construction

Sky Gate Bridge

In 1990, a 3 km bridge was completed to connect the island to the mainland at Rinku Town, at a cost of $1 billion.

Sky Gate Bridge

Expansion

4,000 m (13,000 ft.) second runway and terminal was constructed in 2003.

The second runway opened on 2 August 2007 after a $8 billion expense.

Airport size expanded to 10.5 km2.

A new terminal building opened in late 2012.

Additional plans for a third runway with a length of 3,500 m (11,483 ft.), a new cargo terminal and expanding the airport size to 13 km2 were postponed for economic reasons.

Terminal 1

The main KIX passenger Terminal l is a single four-story building

It has a gross floor space of 296,043 square meters.

It is the longest airport terminal in the world, at a total length of 1.7 km.

The terminal's roof is shaped like an airfoil to promote air circulation through the building.

Terminal 2

Terminal 2 is a low-cost carrier (LCC) terminal designed to attract more LCCs by providing lower landing fees than terminal 1.

Currently this terminal is not directly accessible by train. A free shuttle bus transports passengers from Kansai International Airport's train station to Terminal.

Flights

• Weekly International Passenger Flights : 710

• Weekly International Freighter Flights : 152

• Weekly Domestic Flights : 495

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References

• The official website of KIA http://www.kansai-airport.or.jp/en/index.asp

• Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansai_International_Airport#cite_note-Nikko-4

• Wiki Travel http://wikitravel.org/en/Kansai_International_Airport

• YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ffhkko4i4Uc

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