Bahrain International Airport

Bahrain International is the principal airport of the Kingdom of Bahrain and the longest continuously operating international airport in the Persian Gulf — scheduled services began in 1927 when Imperial Airways routed its London–India passenger flights through Muharraq. That first-mover status gave the airport an outsized role in Gulf aviation history, and through the 1970s it was the region's busiest hub, hosting the only scheduled Concorde service east of London (British Airways, 1976–2003) and serving as the Middle East terminus of the Empire Route. The airport sits on Muharraq Island just north of Manama and operates as the sole hub for Gulf Air, Bahrain's flag carrier and one of the founding airlines of the Gulf region (established 1950). Two parallel runways — the primary at 3,955 m (12,979 ft) — support 81 routes to 55 destinations across 25 airlines. Gulf Air's network focuses on the Indian subcontinent, Europe, and intra-Gulf services; it has not pursued the superconnector strategy of Emirates, Qatar Airways, or Etihad, giving BAH a more focused traffic profile weighted toward origin-and-destination business travel rather than sixth-freedom transit. A new $1.1B passenger terminal opened in 2021, tripling capacity to 14M passengers annually and replacing the 1970s facility. The terminal is notable for its Gulf-vernacular architecture and short airside walking distances. The airport also hosts Bahrain's military airfield (Shaikh Isa Air Base operations were historically based here) and a major US Navy presence tied to the Fifth Fleet's Manama headquarters. BAH moved approximately 9.5M passengers in 2023.