Debrecen International Airport

Foundation and early years

The history of Debrecen Airport goes back to the early 20th Century. The first official regular flight carrying mail took off in 1930. Subsequently, the airport served sport and military purposes. From 1930, it had remarkable domestic traffic serving flights from Debrecen to Budapest and to other major cities in Hungary. During World War II it was the base of a Hungarian bombing squad.

Between 1946 and 1968, Debrecen Airport functioned also as an emergency airfield for Budapest Airport. Following World War II, the Soviet air force had control over the airport until 1990. One of the last Soviet units at the airfield appears to have been the 727th Guards Bomber Aviation Regiment, which left in 1987.^[3] The political transition brought the revival of the airport and international civilian traffic was launched together with sports aviation.

In May 1991, Soviet troops vacated the airport and handed it over to the Hungarian government. In 1994, the Debrecen Municipal Government realized the need to develop the airport and included it in its development plan. The city purchased the airport and has been steadily developing it.

Development since 2000

By 2004, the city of Debrecen had invested 3.5 billion forints to purchase, operate, and continually develop Debrecen Airport.

On 18 June 2012, Wizz Air launched its scheduled service between Debrecen and London-Luton, initially with 3 weekly flights. In 2012–2013, Tatarstan Airlines operated a bi-weekly flight to Moscow-Domodedovo. After the disaster of Tatarstan Airlines Flight 363 which forced Tatarstan Airlines into bankruptcy, the route was taken over by UTair Aviation. In 2014, due to souring Russia–European Union relations, a number of punitive sanctions were implemented vice versa that forced UTair to cancel the flight.^[4]

In 2015, Wizz Air established a cadet pilot school at the airport^[5] under the company Pharma-Flight Kft which also researches and produces pharmaceutical products for flight staff. Wizz Air in 2015 announced they would base one Airbus A320 at Debrecen.^[6]

The construction of a new "innovation and incubation centre" at the airport which would host the new terminal on its ground floor began in June 2015.^[7] and scheduled to open in 2017.

In July 2024, Wizz Air announced it would close its Debrecen base by October 2024, leading to the cancellation of most routes.^[8]

Top destinations

More information Rank, Airport ...

Busiest routes (2019)

Rank	Airport	Passengers handled 2018/19
1	London-Luton	154,819
2	Eindhoven	048,743
3	Tel Aviv	044,671
4	Paris-Beauvais	044,154
5	Dortmund	038,234
6	Barcelona	033,801
7	Doncaster/Sheffield	032,703
8	Moscow-Vnukovo	031,659
9	Milan-Malpensa	030,562
10	Basel/Mulhouse	028,769

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Annual passenger numbers

More information Passengers handled, Passenger % Change ...

	Passengers handled[a]	Passenger % Change
2004	21,476	n/a
2005	42,119	0128.78%
2006	58,939	011.53%
2007	61,900	016.13%
2008	72,650	0−0.58%
2009	89,060	0−41.24%
2010	104,415	0−2.57%
2011	129,135	0−21.62%
2012	157,746	0149.52%
2013	184,231	0170.66%
2014	208,709	012.75%
2015	231,212	018.19%
2016	259,965	065.47%
2017	,184	011,01%
2018	421,391	019.87%
2019	601,236	057.64%
2020	709,106	0-79.58%
2021	705,716	0-38.31%
2022	729,448	0229.45%
2023	768,131	022.72%
Source: KSH,[23] OpenPR[24]

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Bus

Buses Airport1 and Airport2 are operated by the local public transport company, called Debreceni Közlekedési Vállalat (DKV). Airport1 runs between the airport and the main train station of Debrecen, where connections are available to local, regional and international buses, trams and trains, while Airport2 runs between the Airport and the northern end of the city. The schedule of the buses are matched with the departure and arrival times of the planes at the airport, serving all inbound and outbound flights and can be used with any of the regular DKV tickets or passes.^[25]

A direct bus connection was established in March 2016 between Nagyvárad (Oradea) and Debrecen International Airport. The schedule is matched with the arrival and departure times of the planes.

Train

The airport has a recently reconstructed direct rail connection, but it is used for freight moving only. It will be made suitable for passenger traffic only if there is a reasonable demand for the construction sometime in the future.^[26]