Vietnam To Double Hanoi Airport Capacity

Vietnam is planning a USD$5.5 billion expansion of Hanoi's airport to double its capacity by 2030, the government news website reported.

Noi Bai Airport likely will be over-stretched by 2019 due to strong passenger growth, the director general of the Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam told the government news website.

Vietnam is among the world's 10 fastest growing aviation markets in percentage terms, and is expected to double in size each decade over the next 20 years, according to an IATA report late last year.

The government added a second terminal to Hanoi airport at the end of 2014 that almost doubled its capacity to 25 million passengers a year. The new expansion will boost capacity to 50 million people a year by 2030.

Details of the plan are not yet completed and are subject to government approval, Lai Xuan Thanh told the website.

The Communist country's air passenger traffic grew 7.9 percent last year to 20.7 million, while growth in the first five months of 2016 leaped 30.9 percent to 17 million, government data showed.

The country also plans to build a new USD$16 billion airport near the economic hub of Ho Chi Minh City as an eventual competitor to airline hubs in Bangkok and Singapore, on a site that is bigger than both combined.

Vietnam's aviation market has been supported by economic growth of over 5 percent annually since 1999 and competition among domestic airlines that makes flights more affordable.