Hercílio Luz International Airport

Hercílio Luz International Airport is the main gateway to Santa Catarina state in southern Brazil and one of the country's fastest-growing regional international airports, serving Florianópolis — an island capital whose 43 Atlantic-facing beaches attract more than a million Argentine, Uruguayan, and Chilean tourists during the southern-hemisphere summer. FLN handles 42 scheduled routes to 22 nonstop destinations operated by 15 airlines, giving it a notably high airlines-per-destination ratio that reflects intense competition on Brazilian domestic trunk lanes. The airport operates a 7,874 ft (2,400 m) lighted primary runway 14/32 with a shorter 4,331 ft (1,320 m) concrete crosswind strip 03/21 used principally by general aviation. A new terminal, designed by Biselli + Katchborian Arquitetos and inaugurated in October 2019 under the Zurich Airport Brazil concession, replaced a 1960s-era building and increased capacity from 2.7 to 8 million annual passengers. The 70,000 m² building features a sawtooth roofline that evokes the waves of Ingleses Beach on the island's north coast. International significance comes from FLN's role as the principal air-gateway for Mercosur tourist traffic into Brazil's Atlantic beach corridor. Aerolíneas Argentinas, LATAM Chile, and JetSmart operate regular routes from Buenos Aires, Santiago, and Montevideo, with Copa Airlines connecting Panama City year-round. The 2029 completion of the BR-282 duplication is expected to widen the catchment westward across Santa Catarina's highland wine and ski regions. The airport's elevation of 16 ft (5 m) on the southern shore of Florianópolis Island places it within the flood-risk coastal band, and the 2019 terminal was built on raised fill designed for sea-level-rise margins through 2080.