History
The airport owes its origins to military aviation, having been founded as Finningley Airfield in 1915.
During the First World War, it was used as a base by the Royal Flying Corps as they intercepted German Zeppelins targeting the industrial cities of the North. In the Second World War the airfield was used primarily for training purposes, serving as a finishing school for new crews of the larger aircraft in Bomber Command; only a few combat missions took off from Finningley. The Cold War saw the airfield's importance rise when it was used for nuclear-armed Vulcan bombers. Training once again became the priority in the 1970s and 1980s before the airport was decommissioned in 1995.
It was reopened as Robin Hood Airport Doncaster Sheffield in April 2005 after low-cost flights and rising passenger demand made a new commercial airport feasible. The identity of the airport was controversial with 11,000 people signing a petition to oppose it.
The airport's first commercial flight flew to Palma de Mallorca in Majorca, departing at 0915 on 28 April 2005. The airport was projected to serve at least a million passengers during 2006. The actual figure for its first year was 899,000, making the airport the 23rd largest in the UK. By August 2007 the new airport had handled 2.28 million passengers.
Long haul flights to North America began in summer 2007, with Flyglobespan operating to Hamilton, Ontario (for Toronto), and Thomsonfly to Orlando, Cancún and Puerto Plata. All these routes have since been discontinued.
Aer Lingus then launched services to Dublin in 2010, using ATR72 aircraft which were operated by Aer Arann. However load factors made the route no longer viable and it was cancelled in October 2010 just months after its launch.
In December 2009, EasyJet announced that from April 2010 it would operate flights from Doncaster to Amsterdam, Barcelona, Faro, Palma de Mallorca and Prague. These flights were expected to carry 300,000 passengers in the first year of operation. However, EasyJet withdrew all flights from the airport with effect from 4 January 2011.
In May 2010 Thomson Airways announced that it would replace one of its Boeing 737-300's based at the airport with a Boeing 737-800 creating 15,000 additional seats annually. However in May 2011 Thomson Airways announced that it would cut aircraft based at Doncaster by a third, down to two for summer 2012.
Wizz Air announced a new route for summer 2011 to Vilnius, in addition to its services to Gdansk, Katowice, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw. This route is expected to create around 30,000 extra seats. Peel, the airports owners said that "these extra routes would replace the loss of the EasyJet flights". Doncaster is Wizz Air's second largest hub in the United Kingdom after Luton.
In late 2010, Ryanair announced flights to Tenerife South and Faro airports although Faro was deleted for 2012 and the Alicante service dropped due to a dispute with Alicante Airport. For 2012 Ryanair announced flights to Girona.
Since 2011, the airport has been the home base of the last remaining airworthy Avro Vulcan aircraft.
Read more about this topic: Robin Hood Airport Doncaster Sheffield
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