Léopold Sédar Senghor International Airport (French: Aéroport international Léopold-Sédar-Senghor,[1]IATA: DKR, ICAO: GOOY) is an international freight and former passenger airport serving Dakar, the capital of Senegal. The airport is situated near the town of Yoff, a northern suburb of Dakar. It was known as Dakar-Yoff International Airport (French: Aéroport international de Dakar-Yoff) until 9 October 1996,[1] when it was renamed in honor of Léopold Sédar Senghor, the first president of Senegal.
Before the introduction of long-range jets in the mid-1970s, it was an important stopover point for the routes between Europe and South America, along with the Canary Islands.[citation needed]
From 21 January 1976 to 31 March 1982, Air FranceConcordes used the airport as a refueling stop between Paris and Rio de Janeiro on Wednesdays and Sundays.[5][6][7]
The airport was a Space Shuttle landing site until 1987, when it was determined that a dip in the runway could damage the shuttle upon landing.[8]
It was one of the five main hubs of the now defunct multi-national airline Air Afrique.[citation needed]
The airport has often been used as a stopover on flights between North America and Southern Africa. Delta Air Lines started service on 4 December 2006 between Atlanta and Johannesburg, with an intermediate stop in Dakar. This stopover has since been removed, with Dakar now served nonstop by Delta from New York–JFK. South African Airways used Dakar as a stopover with both its flights from Johannesburg to Washington and New York. The stopover for the New York–JFK flight was later removed, while the Johannesburg to Washington–Dulles flight now operates via Accra.[citation needed]
Senegal Airlines had a hub operation and their headquarters at the airport before the company's demise in April, 2016.[9][10][11]
Construction of a replacement airport, Blaise Diagne International, 45 kilometres (28 mi) inland from Léopold Sédar Senghor, began in 2007. Saudi Binladin Group constructed the new airport, named after the first black African elected to France's parliament in 1914, Blaise Diagne. It was initially expected to take 30 months to build and is designed for an initial capacity of 3 million passengers a year – almost double the 1.7 million annual traffic handled by the existing airport.[12] Blaise Diagne was delayed several times and finally opened on 7 December 2017.[13] As of March 2020 Senghor Airport serves only charter flights and scheduled cargo services, but not regular passenger flights.[citation needed]
The airport is also home to the French Air Force's Dakar-Ouakam Air Base (Base aérienne Dakar-Ouakam; also known as Air Base 160, Base aérienne 160 Dakar-Ouakam). The Dakar-Ouakam Air Base formed the military section of the airport.[citation needed]
Since the opening of its successor in 2017, commercial operations were shifted there. However, in January 2024, Air Senegal launched flights to Saint-Louis (XLS) on Mondays and Fridays.[16] There are plans to use Léopold Sédar Senghor International Airport (DKR) as a domestic hub airport for Air Senegal with flights to the interior of the country to Kédougou (KGG), Tambacounda (TUD), and Matam (MAX) using newly acquired Czech L-410 type aircraft .[17]
On 29 August 1960, Air France Flight 343 crashed while attempting to land at Dakar-Yoff Airport during the precursor to what became Hurricane Donna. All 63 passengers and crew on board were killed.[26]
On February 12 2000,an Air AfriqueAirbus A300 with 182 occupants from Dakar to Paris suffered an incident when the left landing gear collapsed.All 182 occupantts survived uninjured but the aircraft was written off.
^"Situation Economique et Sociale (Édition 2010)"(PDF) (in French). Agence Nationale de la statistique et de la démographie. December 2011. p. 228. Archived from the original(PDF) on 7 September 2012. Retrieved 14 June 2012. Les mouvements de passagers ont aussi crû de 8,5%, passant de 1 554 546 en 2009 à 1 687 006 passagers en 2010. [...] Le fret a également progressé de 21 572 tonnes en 2009 à 24 112 en 2010, soit un accroissement de 11,8%