Paris Orly Airport (French: Aéroport de Paris-Orly) (IATA: ORY, ICAO: LFPO) is an international airport located partially in Orly and partially in Villeneuve-le-Roi, 7 NM (13 km; 8.1 mi) south of Paris, France. It serves as a secondary hub for domestic and overseas territories flights of Air France and as the homebase for Transavia France and features flights to destinations in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Caribbean, North America and Southeast Asia.
Prior to the construction of Charles de Gaulle Airport, Orly was the main airport of Paris. Even with the shift of most international traffic to Charles de Gaulle Airport, Orly remains the busiest French airport for domestic traffic and the second busiest French airport overall in passenger traffic, with 29,664,993 passengers in 2015.
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Location
Orly Airport covers 15.3 square kilometres (5.9 sq mi) of land. The airport area, including terminals and runways, spans over two départements and seven communes:
- Essonne département: communes of Paray-Vieille-Poste (West Terminal and half of South Terminal), Wissous, Athis-Mons, Chilly-Mazarin, and Morangis;
- Val-de-Marne département: communes of Villeneuve-le-Roi and Orly (half of South Terminal).
Management of the airport, however, is solely under the authority of Aéroports de Paris, which also manages Charles de Gaulle Airport, Le Bourget Airport, and several smaller airports in the suburbs of Paris.
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History
First years
Originally known as Villeneuve-Orly Airport, the facility was opened in the southern suburbs of Paris in 1932 as a secondary airport to Le Bourget. Before this two huge airship hangars had been built there by the engineer Eugène Freyssinet from 1923 on.
World War II
As a result of the Battle of France in 1940, Orly Airport was used by the occupying German Luftwaffe as a combat airfield, stationing various fighter and bomber units at the airport throughout the occupation. As a result, Orly was repeatedly attacked by the Royal Air Force and United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), destroying much of its infrastructure, and leaving its runways with numerous bomb craters to limit its usefulness by the Germans.
After the Battle of Normandy and the retreat of German forces from the Paris area in August 1944, Orly was partially repaired by USAAF combat engineers and was used by Ninth Air Force as tactical airfield A-47. The 50th Fighter Group flew P-47 Thunderbolt fighter-bomber aircraft from the airport until September, then liaison squadrons used the airfield until October 1945.
Post-war
The USAAF diagram from March 1947 shows the 6140-foot 27/207 (degrees magnetic) runway (later 03R) with 5170-foot 81/261 runway (later 08L) crossing it at its north end. The November 1953 Aeradio diagram shows four concrete runways, all 197 feet wide: 03L 7874 ft, 03R 6069 ft, 08L 5118 ft and 08R 6627 ft.
The American United States Army Air Forces 1408th Army Air Force Base Unit was the primary operator at Orly Field until March 1947 when control was returned to the French Government. (The United States Air Force leased a small portion of the Airport to support Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) at Rocquencourt). The Americans left in 1967 as a result of France's withdrawal from NATO's integrated military command, and all non-French NATO forces were asked to leave France.
In May 1958 Pan Am DC-7Cs flew to Los Angeles in 21 hr 56 min; TWA, Air France and Pan Am flew nonstop to New York in 14 hrs 10-15 min. Air France flew to Tokyo in 31 hr 5 min via Anchorage or 44 hr 45 min on a seven-stop 1049G via India. Air France's ten flights a day to London were almost all Viscounts; the only other London flight was Alitalia's daily DC-6B (BEA was at Le Bourget).
Terminals
Paris-Orly Airport features two separate passenger terminal buildings, Terminal Sud (South Terminal) and Terminal Ouest (West Terminal):
Terminal Sud (South Terminal)
The brick-style southern terminal building consists of six floors. While the smaller basement level -1 as well as the upper levels 2, 3 and 4 contain only some service facilities, restaurants and office space, level 0 features the arrivals facilities as well as several shops and service counters. The airside area and departure gates are located on the upper level 1. The waiting area, which features several shops as well, houses gates A1-A10 and A40-A42 and is furthermore connected to the gate areas Hall A (gates A11-A27) and Hall B (gates B2-B20) to each side of the building. 15 of the terminal's departure gates are equipped with jet-bridges, some of them are able to handle wide-body aircraft.
Terminal Ouest (West Terminal)
The western terminal has a different layout than Terminal Sud, consisting of two floors and a gate area of four "fingers" rather than a brick-style layout. The ground level 0 features the arrivals facilities including 8 baggage reclaim belts as well as several service facilities and shops. The departures area is located on level 1 with more stores and restaurants located here. This central departures area is connected to four gate areas named halls 1-4 which contain departure gates 10A-10P, 20A-20L, 31A-31F and 40A-40G respectively. 23 stands at this terminal are equipped with jet-bridges, with several of them also able to handle wide-body aircraft.
Airlines and destinations
Other facilities
AOM French Airlines had its head office in Orly Airport Building 363 in Paray-Vieille-Poste. After AOM and Air Liberté merged in 2001, the new airline, Air Lib, occupied building 363.
Ground transportation
Train
- Orly Airport is connected to the RER B train line at Antony train station by the Orlyval automatic shuttle. Orlyval is free to use between the two Orly terminals (west and south), however it costs EUR9.30 between Antony and Orly airport.
- Tramway T7 connects the south terminal to Villejuif - Louis Aragon on Paris Métro Line 7.
- A shuttle connects Orly Airport to the RER C train at Pont de Rungis - Aéroport d'Orly.
Car
Orly Airport is connected to the A106 autoroute (spur route of the A6 autoroute).
Buses and coaches
- the RATP buses:
- Orlybus direct to Denfert-Rochereau
- 183 to Porte de Choisy
- "Le Bus Direct" coaches:
- Line 1 to the place Charles de Gaulle through Gare Montparnasse
- Line 3 to Charles de Gaulle Airport
- the Albatrans buses:
- 91.10 to gare de Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines through gare de Massy-Palaiseau
- the Athis Cars buses:
- 8 to gare de Villeneuve-Saint-Georges through gare d'Ablon
- 191.100 to the Marché international de Rungis and gare d'Yerres through gare de Juvisy
- the VEA buses:
- a shuttle direct to Disneyland Paris
- the Noctilien night buses:
- N22 to Place du Châtelet in Paris and gare de Juvisy
- N31 to Paris-Gare de Lyon
- N131 to Paris-Gare de Lyon and gare de Brétigny-sur-Orge
- N144 to gare de Paris-Est and gare de Corbeil-Essonnes
Accidents and incidents
- On 10 February 1948, SNCASE Languedoc P/7 F-BATH of Air France was damaged beyond economical repair at Orly Airport.
- On 3 June 1962, Air France Flight 007, a chartered Boeing 707 named the Chateau de Sully bound for Atlanta, U.S., crashed on take-off with 132 people on board; 130 of them were killed. The only survivors were two stewardesses seated in the rear of the plane. The charter flight was carrying home Atlanta's civic and cultural leaders of the day. At the time, this was the highest recorded death toll for an incident involving a single aircraft.
- On 13 October 1972, Aeroflot Flight 217, an Ilyushin Il-62, departed from Orly for Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) on its way to Moscow. The flight inexplicably crashed on approach to its destination, killing all 174 people on board.
- On 11 July 1973, Varig Flight 820, a Boeing 707, made a forced landing due to fire in a rear lavatory, incoming from Rio de Janeiro-Galeão. The aircraft landed 5 kilometers short of the runway, in a full-flap and gear down configuration. Due mainly to smoke inhalation, there were 123 deaths whilst 11 people survived (10 crew, 1 passenger).
- On 3 March 1974, Turkish Airlines Flight 981, in an event known as the "Ermenonville air disaster", crashed in Ermenonville forest after take-off from Orly on a flight to London's Heathrow Airport when an improperly closed cargo door burst open. The explosive decompression that resulted brought down the McDonnell Douglas DC-10. All 346 people on board were killed, making the accident one of the deadliest in aviation history.
- On 13 January 1975, several men, including Ilich Ramírez Sánchez AKA Carlos the Jackal, made an unsuccessful rocket-propelled grenade attack on an El Al Boeing 707 which was taking off for New York City with 136 passengers. They missed the aircraft, but damaged a JAT McDonnell Douglas DC-9 which had just disembarked passengers from Zagreb. The men tried again on 19 January, again without success when police spotted the terrorists and opened fire with a submachine gun.
- On 20 May 1978, three terrorists opened fire on El Al passengers in the departure lounge. All three terrorists were killed, along with one policeman, and three French tourists were also injured.
- On 15 July 1983, the Armenian underground organisation ASALA bombed a Turkish airline counter in the airport, killing eight people and wounding over 50. The ASALA member Varoujan Garabedian was sentenced to life imprisonment for perpetrating the bombing.
- On 18 March 2017, a man was killed by soldiers patrolling the airport under Opération Sentinelle after he attempted to seize a female soldier's gun. He had also shot and injured a female police officer earlier on.
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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