Airport type Public Serves Aracaju Website Infraero AJU Code AJU Phone +55 79 3212-8500 | Operator Infraero Elevation AMSL 7 m / 23 ft 11/29 2,200 Elevation 7 m Passenger count 1,280,236 | |
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Address Av. Sen. Júlio César Leite, S/N - Santa Teresa, Aracaju - SE, 49037-580, Brazil Similar Avianca, Unidas Rent Car, Abais, Jatobá Praia Hotel, Aju Hostel e Pousada | ||
Aracaju–Santa Maria Airport (IATA: AJU, ICAO: SBAR) is the airport serving Aracaju, Brazil and it is operated by Infraero.
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The airport is under reform. From 2014 until now, there has been a controversial movement around changes on the airport naming rights. Aiming to honor the then PT governor Marcelo Deda, who died in December 2013 in full respect of its mandate, the act play on changing names seeks to recognize one of the greatest institutional reformers on state of Sergipe history. This scene has strained the local political mood through the possibility for the also appointment of parliamentary Pedro Valadares who died in the same accident with then 2014 presidential candidate Eduardo Campos.
More recently other more traditional namesless political and, the ones truly representative of local culture, have also been mentioned such as Silvio Romero and Tobias Barreto. Symptomatic parliamentary resistance by making the naming exchange has enraged some religious groups that have stated that public goods must represent all society and not to favor one particular group over others. They argue, therefore, that more impartiality is needed to local public goods regarding as, for example, its cultural projections. Indeed, it is also undeniable that the current naming rights do not even have specific representation of local culture but of a certain hegemonic roman-catholic group that arbitrary commands 'under the table' major public local goods.
History
Although it had been in operation since the beginning of the 1950s, the official inauguration of the airport took place on 19 January 1958.
In 1961 began the first renovation of the airport complex, with an extension of the runway and enlargement of the passenger terminal.
In 1975 Infraero became the administrator of the airport, which later invested in further extension of the runway (completed in 1993) and in great enlargement of the passenger terminal (completed in 1998).
In 2012 the airport has already started the last extension through the construction of a completely new passenger terminal which will double its capacity.
Accidents and incidents
Access
The airport is located 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) from downtown Aracaju and 3.5 kilometres (2.2 mi) from Atalaia Beach.