New Bid To Name Airport After Aviation Pioneer

A Northern Ireland airport could be renamed after a pioneer of aviation history.

Following Amelia Earhart Week in Londonderry, politicians on the city’s council are making a renewed attempt to rebrand its airport.

They hope to be able to call it the City of Derry Amelia Earhart Airport, after the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic, who landed in nearby Ballyarnet in May 1932.

A motion to change the airport's name was rejected at a Derry City Council meeting in March but a public outcry led to councillors putting forward a renewed attempt.

In a poll on the website of the Derry Journal newspaper, 77% of respondents said they wanted the new name.

Sinn Féin Councillor Elisha McCallion is backing the plan.

She said: "With an ever changing tourism market it's important that as a city we are constantly coming up with new initiatives. I believe that changing the name of the airport can be one important component of that and we need to maximise it as speedily as possible in advance of City of Culture year 2013."

Amelia Earhart's arrival in Ballyarnet was an emergency landing after she suffered technical problems and weather upsets – she had planned to fly from Newfoundland to Paris.

She is honoured in the name of an airport in Atchison, Kansas, where she was born, and with the Amelia Earhart field in Miami.

At City of Derry Airport there is currently a departure lounge named after the pilot.

(NE)