Flood-ravaged Don Mueang airport is due to reopen for commercial flights next Tuesday with a bit of fanfare officiated the day before by Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra.
Home sweet home: Nok Air’s passenger check-in counters remain unchanged at Don Mueang’s Terminal 1.
Bangkok's old airport, which closed last Oct 25 during the deluge that paralysed central provinces and Bangkok for two months, will serve only one scheduled airline, the budget carrier Nok Air.
Orient Thai, the other budget airline that used to operate through Don Mueang in the pre-flood period, has yet to set a return from Suvarnabhumi.
Don Mueang director Kanphat Mangkhlasiri confirmed that the airport was "100%" ready to resume operations next week.
Nok Air executives said separately that the airline will begin ferrying its aircraft Monday afternoon at the end of scheduled service at Suvarnabhumi, with nearly all of its fleet of 14 aircraft slated for normal flights starting at 6am on Tuesday.
They said facilities required to support Nok Air's operation, particularly at Terminal 1, were largely spared by the floods and all systems are now ready.
Nok Air will continue to provide passenger check-in service at Row 6 on the third floor of Terminal 1, with existing flight dates and times unchanged.
The carrier, which operates 35 domestic flights a day, has been eager to return to its home base. Heavy congestion at Suvarnabhumi has forced it to burn more jet fuel waiting for take-off slots, causing flight delays and frustration for passengers.
Initially Nok Air's on-time performance at Suvarnabhumi slipped to 28% before improving to 75-80% recently. The airline's pre-flood record at Don Mueang was 96%.
By resuming operations at Don Mueang, Nok Air should be able to woo back passengers and attract new clientele who prefer to travel through the airport, where it takes five-10 minutes after landing to get to ground transport.
Next week's reopening means that Nok Air will have the entire facility at its disposal. No other airlines have expressed interest in staging operations from the old airport.
Airports of Thailand Plc (AoT) has blamed the vacuum on unclear government policies and lacklustre support.
A stumbling block is a state directive that Bangkok's old airport should only serve carriers with point-to-point domestic services.
AoT planners are keen to see Don Mueang help with off-loading traffic from the congested Suvarnabhumi, whose passenger throughput is expected to soar to 51 million passengers this year despite a design capacity of 45 million.
During its heyday, Don Mueang served nearly 39 million passengers a year. Since September 2011, it handled just 3.97 million, note AoT statistics.