Dulles Airport Washington DC

Even though National Airport had opened only in 1941, it was too small to service the age of jets. In 1958 President Eisenhower decided on the location of the new airport. The site in Fairfax and Loudon Counties of Virginia was large, 10,000 acres were acquired. Only 3,000 were being used for the airport. The architectural firm of Amman and Whitney were selected to design the airport. The building of the airport began on September 2, 1958.

The airport began with one large terminal without extensions for aircraft. It has three runways two North-South 11,500 feet long and one 10,000 feet northwest to southeast. All were ILS. The airport opened on November 17, 1962, by President Kennedy. It was named after Secretary of State John Foster Dulles. When the airport opened, it was noted for the mobile lounges that brought passengers to their jets. When the airport opened Brannif, Delta, Eastern, TWA, and Northwest served the airport.

Passenger Traffic at Dulles grew rapidly. In 1975 it served 2.5 million people, five million in 1985 and ten million in 1987. By 1999 it 19.8 million. A fourth runway was seed in November 2008. In 2017 the airport handled 22,716,399 passengers. The following airlines serve Dulles :
Aer Lingus, Aeroflot, Aeromexico, Air Canada, Air China, Air France, Air India, Alaska Air, American Airlines, ANA, Austrian, Avianca, British Airways, Brussels Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Copa Airlines, Delta, Emirates, Ethiopian Airlines, Ethiad, Frontier, Icelandair, Jet Blue, KLM, Lufthansa, Porter, Qatar, Royal Air Maroc, SAS, Saudi, South African Airlines, Southwest, Turkish, United, Virgin Atlantic, and Volaris.