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Los Rodeos Airport , also known as "Tenerife North Airport", is one of 2 international airports on the island of Tenerife , the other one being the much larger and busier Reina Sofía Airport , also called "Tenerife South Airport". Los Rodeos Airport , "Tenerife North Airport", is located 11 km by road from the capital Santa Cruz De Tenerife , and is mostly used for conecting Tenerife city with Mainland Spain and for inter canary island flights. The popular resorts of Los Cristianos and Las Americas lie 90 km away to the south-west and are much better served by the other airport of the island of Tenerife, the Reina Sofia Airport , also called "Tenerife South Airport". In 1977 , 2 Boeing 747's planes collided on the runaway, KLM-PanAm crash ,after the KLM plane started to taking off without permission from the Air Control Tower, killing 583 persons. The worst aircraft accident in history. HISTORY In the winter of 1929 , many years before the airport had even been built, the field at Los Rodeos was hastily prepared to accommodate the first (though unofficial) flight into Tenerife operated by an Arado VI (D-1594) aircraft operating from Berlin on behalf of Deutsche Lufthansa . In May 1930, the Compañía de Líneas Aéreas Subvencionadas S.A. (C.L.A.S.S.A.) established the first air link between the Spanish mainland and the Canary Islands using a Ford 4-AT Trimotor (M-CKKA), which took off from Getafe, Madrid to the Los Rodeos field via Casablanca , Cape Juby and Gando in Gran Canaria After the final location of the airport had been decided, funds were gathered between 1935 and 1939 to build a small hangar and begin expanding the airstrip which would become Los Rodeos airport. After the interruption of civil flights caused by Spanish Civil War , operations into Los Rodeos recommenced on 23rd of January 1941 with the a De Havilland DH89A Dragon Rapide operating an Iberia flight from Gando in Gran Canaria By 1946 , more hangars, a passenger terminal and an 800m paved runway had been built, and the airport was officially opened to all national and international traffic. The runway was stretched various times during the 1940’s and 50’s until reaching a length of 2,400m in 1953 , by which time the airport was also equipped with runway edge lighting and an air-groung radio, enabling nocturnal operations. By 1964 , runway 12-30 had been stretched to 3,000m to accommodate the DC-8, new Navaids (Navigation Aids) were installed, and the apron was expanded to provide more parking spaces for aircraft. In 1971, with the prospect on the Boeing 747 flying into the airport, the runway was re-enforced and an ILS (Instrument Landing System) was installed. However, after sharp increases in passenger numbers in the 1990s, the airport underwent a process of modernisation between 2002 and 2005, culminating with a new car park, motorway access ramps, a new four-story passenger terminal with 12 gates and 6 'fingers', and a new separate terminal for insular flights. As well as offering a selection of domestic and international connections, Los Rodeos has become an inter-island Hub 'par excellence', connecting with all of the 6 other islands. Accidents AIRLINES The airport is served by the following national and international airlines:
DESTINATIONS The route between Los Rodeos/Tenerife North and Gran Canaria International Airport is the busiest with an average 40 flights per day between the two islands . The following are the destinations served by scheduled airlines from Los Rodeos (as of April 2006):
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