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ASIA-PACIFIC AIRPORTS MAGAZINE
Don Mueang Airport – Water world: Don Mueang Airport pictured during the 2011 Bangkok floods.
SPECIAL REPORT: SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Flood warning! Vivek Sindhamani and Peter Vorage discuss the growing threat of flooding to airports and how some of the region’s major hubs are planning ahead to increase their resilience to rising water levels.
D
uring the past five years, over twenty major, and many more small-island airports, have flooded due to extreme rainfall events or storm surges in combination with a rise in sea levels. The list includes Chennai International Airport in India in 2015; Japan’s Kansai International Airport as a result of Typhoon Jebi in 2018; Cochin Airport in India which was left partly submerged after severe rainfall in Kerala in 2019; and Grand Bahama International Airport in the Bahamas, closed in the wake of Hurricane Dorian the same year. APA Issue 1, 2020
These events are just the tip of the (melting) iceberg as the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has predicted a continued increase of sea levels and occurrences of erratic rainfall events. Many ACI member-airports were constructed in coastal or river floodplain areas since these were the only large, flat surfaces available for safe aircraft operations. This situation has become increasingly critical due to increased urbanisation in these airports’ surrounding areas. This, in turn, has reduced natural water buffering
