Qualla: Anglesey Airport

Anglesey Airport: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit 瑞丽江的河水, CC BY-SA 4.0. Until June 2022 you could buy a ticket in Cardiff on a Monday morning and be in Holyhead, on the far side of Wales, before noon. The journey took one hour by air on a small turboprop, against five hours by train through Birmingham or six by car around the long way. The single-storey terminal at Anglesey Airport, a £1 million prefabricated building delivered to the airfield in 2007, was the only civilian face of the country's only commercial connection between its capital and its northwest tip. Then COVID grounded the route, and the Welsh Government announced it would no longer pay the subsidy. The terminal still stands. The runways are still active, as part of RAF Valley. But for the first time since 2007, you cannot fly between Cardiff and Anglesey at all. In May 2024, Isle of Anglesey County Council confirmed in writing what everyone in the area already knew: the airport had closed.

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Image: 瑞丽江的河水 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Anglesey Airport: Built on a Hawk Base

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ian Greig, CC BY-SA 2.0. The runways belong to RAF Valley (ICAO: EGOV), a Royal Air Force station on the southern coast of Holy Island that has been training military pilots since 1941. Today Valley is home to No. 4 Flying Training School and 22 Squadron, who teach the fast-jet pilots of the RAF on BAE S...

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Image: Ian Greig | CC BY-SA 2.0

Anglesey Airport: Thirteen Years on the Subsidy

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. The Anglesey-Cardiff route went live in May 2007 with two flights each weekday in each direction, the trip taking just under an hour. The operating airline changed several times - Links Air ran it first, then Citywing, then Eastern Airways under a Flybe franchise - reflecting how...

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Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

Anglesey Airport: Decision in Cardiff

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. The Anglesey-Cardiff route never resumed. In June 2022, after two years of subsidy paid for an aircraft that was not flying, the Welsh Government formally announced that the service would not be restarted - the case for the subsidy in a changed travel landscape, post-COVID and wi...

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Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain