Jacksonville International Airport

History

Construction started in 1965 on a new airport to handle travel to nearby naval bases. The new airport was dedicated on September 1, 1968, replacing Imeson Field which carried the same IATA code of JAX. Terrain precluded lengthening the runways at Imeson, a necessity with the inception of commercial jet airliners. A new idea at JIA was separating departing and arriving passengers on different sides of the terminal. This is no longer the case, and the airport now uses the more typical layout with departing passengers on an upper level with an elevated roadway, and arriving passengers on the lower level.

The new airport was slow to expand, only serving two million passengers a year by 1982, but it served over five million annually by 1999 and an expansion plan was approved in 2000. The first phase, which included rebuilding the landside terminal, the central square and main concessions area, as well as consolidating the security checkpoints at one location, and more parking capacity was completed in 2004–2005. In 2007, 6,319,016 passengers were processed.

The second phase of the expansion program was carried out over three years, commencing in mid-2006 and projected to cost about $170 million. Concourses A and C were completely rebuilt; the former concourses have been demolished. Work on Concourse B was given a low priority because the capacities of the rebuilt Concourses A and C were more than adequate for existing demand. The expansion was designed by Reynolds, Smith & Hills (RS&H).

The economic downturn of 2009 caused a decrease in passengers and flights. This led the JAA to commence the demolition of Concourse B in June 2009 because it was safer and easier for the contractor. After the debris was removed, asphalt was laid to provide space for ground equipment parking. The concourse will be rebuilt when passenger traffic increases, which the JAA had originally projected would occur in 2013 but did not materialize. A section of the old concourse eventually became part of an airline club lounge which opened in 2019.

Expansion

In 2018, the airport handled 6,460,253 passengers, breaking the previous record set in 2007. 7,186,639 passengers were handled in 2019. This increase in traffic prompted the JAA to revive the plan to rebuild concourse B and in 2019 RS&H and Jacobs Engineering were chosen to perform the design, while Balfour Beatty was selected as the construction manager for the concourse B project. However, the project was put on hold again due to the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting decrease in passenger demand. By 2022 traffic recovered to over 6.5 million passengers annually and the expansion project was restarted. On May 10, 2024, ground was broken on the new Concourse B, which will house six new gates, with the ability to expand to up to 10 additional gates. Concourse B is anticipated to be completed by the end of 2026. The design of concourses A and C also allow them to be extended to accommodate additional gates.

Operations

Facilities

The airport covers 7911 acre and has two concrete runways: 08/26, 10,000 x 150 ft (3,048 x 46 m) and 14/32, 7,701 x 150 ft (2,347 x 46 m). The terminal at JAX is composed of a baggage claim area, on the first floor and a ticketing area on the second floor, at the front of the structure. Past baggage claim and ticketing is the mezzanine, where shops, restaurants and the security checkpoint are located. Beyond the mezzanine are the airport's Concourses A and C, which include 10 gates each (for a total of 20), along with other shops and restaurants.

The airport also has a Delta Sky Club on Concourse A and a multi-airline passenger club located behind the airside food court.

There are three galleries located off of the main courtyard before the security checkpoint. One features an art exhibit, the second houses a revolving exhibit about a Jacksonville-area landmark or institution, and the third houses a permanent exhibit highlighting the history of aviation in the region.

In the year ending February 28, 2023, the airport had 99,616 aircraft operations, an average of 273 per day: 63% scheduled commercial, 19% general aviation, 14% air taxi and 4% military. In February 2023, there were 72 aircraft based at this airport: 3 single-engine and 3 multi-engine airplanes, 46 jet, and 20 military.

The airport has multiple fixed-base operators for transient general aviation aircraft. Besides fuel, the two offer services such as maintenance, catering, hangars, and courtesy and rental cars; there are also amenities such as internet, conference rooms, vending machines, crew lounges, snooze rooms, and showers.

Runways

The airport has two runways: 08/26 and 14/32, laid out in a "V" pattern (with the tip of the "V" pointing west). Originally, a plan existed to build two more runways, each next to one of the existing runways. However, the airport's latest master plan, introduced in 2020, proposed a different future layout. Instead of an additional runway alongside runway 14/32, a new 8000-foot runway would be built in the southwestern portion of the airport, offset from, but in a direction parallel to runway 08/26, the existing northern runway. The future runway will extend westwards from near the southern end of runway 14/23 and would require relocating Terrell Road. This plan would result in an airfield layout resembling an inverted "Z", which would allow for a traffic pattern that provides for simultaneous independent operations on the current runway 08/26 (which would be re-designated 08L/26R) and the future southern runway (08R/26L), while eliminating the directional conflict at the tip of the current "V" layout. The north and south parallel runways will be separated by distance of approximately 7,500 feet.

Military facilities

Concurrent with the closure of Imeson Airport, the 125th Fighter-Interceptor Group (125 FIG) of the Florida Air National Guard (FANG) relocated to Jacksonville International Airport. Military Construction (MILCON) funds provided for the establishment of Jacksonville Air National Guard Base in the southwest quadrant of the airport and placement of USAF-style emergency arresting gear on the JAX runways. Upgraded from group to wing status and redesignated as the 125th Fighter Wing (125 FW) in the early 1990s, the wing is the host unit for Jacksonville ANGB and operates F-15C and F-15D Eagle aircraft. The 125 FW is operationally-gained by the Air Combat Command (ACC). The first Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning arrived on March 4, 2025.

Jacksonville ANGB is a small air force base, without the military housing, military hospital or other infrastructure of major U.S. Air Force installations. The Air National Guard provides a fully equipped USAF Crash Fire Rescue station to augment the airport's own fire department for both on-airport structural fires and aircraft rescue and firefighting (ARFF) purposes. The base employs approximately 300 full-time military personnel (ART and AGR) and 1,000 part-time military personnel who are traditional air national guardsmen.

Airlines and destinations

Passenger

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Cargo

| FedEx Express |Memphis, Indianapolis | UPS Airlines |Louisville, San Juan, Philadelphia

Statistics

Passenger traffic

The 2024 fiscal year (10/1/2023-9/30/2024) set a record for passenger numbers at Jacksonville International Airport. handling 7,647,916 passengers, which was a 4.7% increase from the prior fiscal year.

Annual traffic

Top destinations

Airline market share

Ground transportation

Main article: Jacksonville Transportation Authority

Jacksonville International Airport has direct public transit service to Jacksonville Transportation Authority's bus network. The Route 1 bus connects the airport to downtown Jacksonville, with connections to Greyhound Bus Lines and to the Jacksonville Skyway monorail system.

Accidents and incidents

• On October 4, 1971, George M. Giffe Jr. hijacked a plane in Nashville, Tennessee, then forced the pilot to fly to Jacksonville, where Giffe killed his wife, the pilot, and himself when cornered by the FBI.
• On December 6, 1984, Provincetown-Boston Airlines Flight 1039 crashed on takeoff, killing 11 passengers and 2 crew on board. The debris from the Tampa-bound flight burned near Lem Turner Road. The 1986 National Transportation Safety Board report cited an elevator trim control system failure, which caused separation of the horizontal stabilizer.
• On December 21, 2001, a Piper PA-32 Cherokee Six crashed while making a missed approach at the Jacksonville International Airport. The crash was attributed to spatial disorientation.
• On December 14, 2002, a Beech 200 King Air landed with collapsed landing gear after the gear failed to retract after departure. The probable cause of the incident was found to be a failure of the main landing gear locking mechanism for undetermined reasons, which resulted in the main landing gear collapsing, and damage to the airplane during landing.
• On October 28, 2004, a Scottish Aviation Bulldog model 120 collided with trees then experienced collapse of the right main landing gear during an emergency landing at the Jacksonville International Airport. The probable cause of the accident was found to be the pilot's failure to maintain altitude/clearance with trees.
• On November 28, 2005, a Beechjet 400 made a successful emergency landing at the Jacksonville International Airport after losing both engines in cruise flight.
• On April 30, 2025, a Delta Air Lines Boeing 757 en route to Atlanta returned to Jacksonville after departure. The aircraft experienced a mechanical issue with its flaps and landed safely.
• On November 2, 2025, a man broke through a security door at the Jacksonville International Airport, stole a car, and drove around the airport area. After being arrested, the man admitted to the breach and said that, though he does not know how to fly a plane, he would learn.

2025 Parking Garage Incident

On May 16, 2025, the Hourly Parking Garage structure suffered damage after a vehicle caught fire. The fire quickly spread across a portion of the 3rd level, affecting around 50 vehicles and causing a partial collapse of the 2nd and 3rd levels. The garage will remain closed indefinitely until its structural integrity can be examined.

As of June 2025, the origin of the fire was linked to a single BMW, though it is still unclear how the fire spread so significantly. The airport is expected to spend $38 million to fix the garage; while insurance proceeds are expected to play a large role, it is not completely clear how the full cost of the fix will be covered.

The airport says it may use the opportunity to add an additional floor to the parking garage as well as a sprinkler system to help suppress future fires.

References

References

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