Fatimah Muhammad Saudi Gazette JEDDAH — The General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) has denied press reports that the organization was not keen on upgrading the Taif airport and using it during peak Haj and Umrah seasons to ease pressure on King Abdulaziz International Airport (KAIA) in Jeddah. Khaled Al-Khaibari, GACA spokesman, told Saudi Gazette that six foreign carriers currently operate to the airport with 74 weekly flights from the UAE, Egypt and Turkey. A local Arabic newspaper reported recently that GACA was not willing to upgrade the Taif airport as a regional airport to help overcome problems faced by passengers in peak seasons. Al-Khaibari said GACA has already completed a viability study on a new airport in Taif. The authority is now carrying out renovation work on the current airport that will take a year and a half to complete and will increase its capacity from 350,000 to 550,000 passengers annually. The terminal area will increase from 4,400 square meters to 5,600 square meters. The Arabic newspaper reported that GACA was not ready to welcome pilgrims at the Taif airport due to technical reasons and that it was trying to find solutions to these issues with the help of the Ministry of Haj. In a press statement, GACA said what was published in the Arabic newspaper was not accurate and did not reflect its vision of upgrading the Taif airport as a regional airport, ready to welcome the increasing Haj and Umrah traffic. GACA said it was working on a royal order to rehabilitate the current Taif airport and utilize it for Haj traffic. A committee comprising representatives of the Ministry of Haj and other concerned bodies has been formed to implement the plan. The number of Umrah pilgrims from abroad this season is expected to reach 5 million. The Jeddah airport, after its latest expansion, has a capacity to handle 12 million passengers annually. The hill resort of Taif is a popular tourist destination that attracts a visitors from within the Kingdom and neighboring Gulf countries, especially during summer. There was an overall 13.6 percent increase in the number of passengers to Saudi airports in 2011 compared to the previous year, according to statistics released by GACA.
