Spanish airport closes

Santiago-Rosalía de Castro Airport in Galicia shut to all air traffic on Thursday, April 23, and will stay closed through May 27 while crews rebuild the runway. (aena.es) Aena, Spain’s airport operator, said the closure lasts 35 days and covers the most complex phase of a deep pavement renewal project that began on January 13. No takeoffs or landings will be allowed during that window. (aena.es) The airport’s public terminal area and parking lot are staying open, even though the runway is closed. Aena said airlines have already shifted part of Santiago service to the nearby airports in A Coruña and Vigo. (aena.es) That rerouting matters because Santiago is Galicia’s main air gateway. The airport handled 3,120,759 passengers and 24,837 flights in 2025, according to Aena’s year-end figures. (aena.es) The timing also catches the spring travel season in northwest Spain, including trips tied to Santiago de Compostela, one of Europe’s best-known pilgrimage destinations. Aena said it scheduled the shutdown before the airport’s summer peak and during a period with weather more favorable for construction. (aena.es) The work is bigger than a basic resurfacing. Aena said contractors will lay about 73,000 tons of asphalt, repaint 13,600 square meters of runway markings, install about 900 light-emitting diode beacons, and run more than 100 kilometers of cable. (aena.es) The contract covers runway lighting, drainage, ground leveling in critical areas, safety strips on both sides of the runway, and renewal of the airport’s instrument landing systems, the radio aids pilots use to line up for landing in low visibility. Aena put the contract value at €26.613 million. (aena.es) Travelers checking flight status are now seeing the closure notice on the airport’s own homepage, which says Santiago-Rosalía de Castro will remain closed from April 23 to May 27, 2026. For the next five weeks, getting into Galicia by air means landing somewhere else first. (aena.es)