The first shipment of rock armour for the extension of Sumburgh Airport’s main instrument runway arrived in Shetland last week and has now been installed.

A barge carrying 8,000 tonnes of rock armour, quarried in Norway, arrived at the airport site and was unloaded during the week. It is the first of eight shipments that will carry a total of 71,000 tonnes of blocks to the airport site to secure the outer limits of the runway extension.

The shipment was offloaded at the site and the material was placed around the outer limits of the land reclamation at both runway ends. The remaining seven shipments are scheduled to arrive on site between now and the end of September 2005 and will be installed before the winter.

The £10 million runway extension project involves the extension of the runway’s eastern and western ends into the sea through land reclamation and will open up opportunities to increase capacity on existing air services and develop new scheduled air services with larger aircraft types.

More than 200,000 m³ of infill material has already been deposited in the sea by principal contractor Balfour Beatty since work started on site on 25 April. The project’s total infill requirement is 300,000 m³. This material has been extracted from the Wilsness Hill area of the airport which will be redeveloped for airport uses in due course. Work is progressing without interruption to the airport’s operations.

The runway extension is the largest ever capital project undertaken by HIAL and is being project managed by Shetland Islands Council. It involves extending the runway and modifications to the existing airfield ground lighting and instrument landing system at the airport.

The project has been the key aim for the members of the Sumburgh Airport Strategic Partnership (SASP) for more than two years. The partnership comprises HIAL, Shetland Islands Council, Shetland Enterprise, and Sumburgh Airport Consultative Committee. The project is also one of the Highlands and Islands Strategic Transport Partnership’s (HITRANS) infrastructure priorities for the region.

Funding commitments from the SASP partners and the Scottish Executive, via HITRANS, were finalised earlier this year along with match funding from the European Regional Development Fund through the Highlands and Islands Special Transitional Programme 2000-2006.

The project has a target date of 31 October 2006 for the extended runway becoming operational.

HIAL’s Infrastructure Services Manager, Grant Dudgeon, said: “The project is progressing to programme and the delivery of the first load of rock armour this week marks a move into a new phase of construction. Over the coming months the rock armour will be used to reinforce and secure the land reclamation and will facilitate work on site during the winter months.

“This is a groundbreaking project in UK aviation industry terms and the end result will be a runway that will enhance the operational capabilities of the airport and support the development of new scheduled and oil industry traffic. This will be good news for the islands in both transport and economic terms.”

ENDS