Doncaster Sheffield Robin Hood Airport opened for business in April 2005 and flies holiday-makers from South Yorkshire and beyond area to Europe and beyond. It has been built on the old Finningley Airfield which was used by the RAF for many years. If you're flying into Doncaster, check out these pictures.

Peel Holdings now operate the airport and Thomson.com operate many routes from the former RAF base.

The latest news (August 2005) is that there will be daily flights from Doncaster to Geneva, provided by easyJet.

Non-stop flights to America and the Caribbean have also been announced recently.

All photos are copyright.

Doncaster Airport now handles cargo planes as well as passenger planes.

Robin Hood Airport Doncaster Sheffield is an international airport located at the former RAF Finningley airbase in Finningley, South Yorkshire, England. The airport lies 6 nautical miles southeast of Doncaster and eighteen miles from Sheffield. The Airport principally serves the metropolitan counties of South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire moreover due to its key location, a population of more than six million potential customers can access the airport within a 60 minute drive.

The opening was marked by the first commercial flight from the airport, destined for Palma in Majorca, which departed exactly on time at 0915 on April 28, 2005. The Captain of the first flight from Robin Hood Airport was Paul Rafferty of Thomsonfly1. The airport is expected to see at least one million passengers during 2006. Three months after opening the airport had handled 300,000 passengers, by December 2005 the figure rose to 500,000 and within the first year had risen to 900,000 passengers. 60 weeks after opening, the airport had handled over 1 million passengers.

Doncaster Sheffield Airport has a CAA Public Use Aerodrome Licence (Number P876) that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction.

The majority of flights from the airport are operated by Thomsonfly, with a few flights operated by Thomas Cook, Pegasus, Air Europa, BH Air, Wizzair, Flybe, Flyglobespan, Onur Air and Ryanair. On 28th March 2006 Ryanair announced an expansion of their services from Doncaster, with additional flights to Pisa and Girona. On 26th June 2006, Flybe announced it was establishing a twice daily service from Doncaster to Belfast City Airport from October 2006. In September 2006, Flyglobespan announced that from Summer 2007, weekly flights from Doncaster would commence to Toronto, Canada, this being the first scheduled long-haul destination served from Doncaster. It was also announced at a Dubai conference on 18th September 2006 that Pakistani Airline Shaheen Air International will be flying from Doncaster Sheffield to Islamabad and Toronto from Summer 2007. Also Wizzair have annouced they are to start a four times weekly service to Gdansk and increase the frequency of the Katowice route to four times weekly both from July 2007. Late November Goldtrail Holidays announced that they would be flying to Dalaman from the Airport Summer 2007 using Onur Air.

70 years of aviation at Finningley is marked by a fly past, speeches and a new garden.

On Friday March 31st Robin Hood Airport celebrated to 10th anniversary of  the closure of RAF Finningley.

 There was a flypast by RAF Tucano aircraft, speeches by Group Captain Andy Sudlow and the Reverend David Ottewell, vicar of Holy Trinity and St Oswald's Church, Finningley.

Managing Director David Ryall made a speech.

The statue is by artist Geoffrey Wax and is in stainless steel. It is in a garden in front of the airport. The sculpture is entitle 'Aviator' and represents the next chapter as a civil airport.