Airports operator ACV tasked with Dien Bien Airport upgrade

By Anh Tu March 28, 2021 | 04:03 am PT

An aircraft seen on an apron at the Dien Bien Airport in northern Dien Bien Province. Photo by Shutterstock/kid315.

The Airports Corporation of Vietnam has been appointed investor of the VND1.5 trillion (over $65 million) project to expand the Dien Bien Airport.

The project will expand the airport terminal’s capacity to half a million passengers a year and enable it receive narrow-bodied aircraft like the Airbus A321, Airbus A320 and equivalents.

The expansion project will be implemented in 34 months. The total investment of VND1.55 trillion required for the airport expansion project will be funded by ACV, which manages 22 airports across the country.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has assigned the Ministry of Planning and Investment to take responsibility for project appraisal, issuing investment guidelines and supervising and evaluating investment activities.

According to a 2030 detailed plan mapped out by the Ministry of Transport, the Dien Bien Airport will have a capacity of 2 million passengers and 10,000 tons of cargo per year.

The Dien Bien Airport in Dien Bien Province, 500 kilometers to the west of Hanoi, was originally a military airport built in 1954.

It began commercial operations in 1994. It has one 1,830-meter runway that can handle the short-haul ATR72 and smaller aircraft. Its current capacity is 0.3 million passengers per year.