Mattala Airport to be ready by October

By Franklin R. Satyapalan

The government had made steady progress in the construction of Sri Lanka’s second international Airport, at Mattala.

It was scheduled to be completed by the end of October this year, Airport and Aviation Services Minister Priyankara Jayaratne said.

He said that the Exim Bank of China had provided Funding to the tune of US $ 209 million for the project and the contractors were China Harbour Engineering Company Ltd and the contract period was 36 months. According to the original contract the construction was to be completed by March 15, 2013, but with the steady progress being made by the Engineers it would be completed by October end this year. The construction was being done under the supervision of Engineers of the Airport and Aviation Services.


Almost 80 per cent of the work on the 3,500-metre long and 75-metre wide runway, 40 per cent of the work on the Air Terminal with the capacity to serve one million passengers, 20 per cent of the work on the cargo terminal with capacity to handle 45,000 tonnes of cargo annually, have been completed.

Nearly half the work on ancillary and fire services building, control tower, apron to park ten aircraft, two kilometres of external road and the internal access roads had been completed, he said.

Minister Jayaratne also said that the Government had taken a policy decision not to import any second hand aircraft for Sri Lankan Airlines in the future as it was economic in the long run to purchase brand new aircraft on soft lease. Then one need not have spent on major repairs for around six years to a decade.
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