Brazil Airports
Brazil is an enormous country, the fifth largest in the world in terms of land area. For this reason, and because the rail system in Brazil has been very poor since the military regimes, air travel is essential to Brazil. The country currently has over 3000 usable airports, although these vary quite a bit in size and in modern facilities.
The largest airports in Brazil in terms of their ranking in passenger transport are Guarulhos International Airport in Sao Paulo, Congonhas-Sao Paulo Airport, the Rio de Janeiro-Galeao Airport and the Brasilia National Airport. These are the four airports in the country that currently handle over 10 million passengers on an annual basis.
The Guarulhos Internation Airport was completed in 1985, when it became the largest airport in Brazil. Its capability is truly substantial as it handles over 20 million passengers every year. It was built to replace the outdated and overwhelmed Congonhas Airport. Congonhas has short runways and cannot accommodate certain aircraft so a replacement was needed for many reasons. The runways cannot be extended because the city has grown in around the airport and it is simply too late to undertake such a change. The fact that the city is so close is both a curse and a blessing. It makes accessing the airport very easy from the city, and when you are approaching the city from the sky the view is absolutely unbelievable. Congonhas is still a very busy airport, as Sao Paulo is a major commercial hub and there are a number of flights that go between it and other cities daily. Despite the capacity of the Guarulhos Airport and the fact that it has run as high as 102% of its anticipated capacity, the Congonhas airport continues to have congestion problems. You are better off getting held up in Guarulhos airport though, as it is much newer and has many shops, restaurants and things to do.
The Rio de Janeiro Airport is called Galeao International Airport. It was constructed in 1952 about twenty kilometers from the city of Rio de Janeiro on an island. At one point it was the largest airport in Brazil but it has since been eclipsed by Guarulhos International Airport in Sao Paulo. The volume of the airport is still high, reaching just above the 10 million mark annually last year. It is not the newest airport as it received its last major renovations in 1977.
Brasilia National Airport is located in the nation’s capital and rounds out the top four. It is one of the airports that is operating at or above its full capacity and it is not uncommon to find your flight having to circle the airport a number of times in order to get a spot on the runway.
Most of the international airports in Brazil are fairly modern and you won’t encounter any major problems. The same cannot always be said for the regional airports; as mentioned before there are over 3000 that are operational but most of them aren’t much more than a short runway.