Early years

Originally, the airport was built by the United States military during World War II, as a replacement for a small British landing strip at Garður to the north. It consisted of two separate two-runway airfields, built simultaneously just 4 km apart. Patterson Field in the south-east opened in 1942 despite being partly incomplete. It was named after a young pilot who died in Iceland. Meeks Field to the north-west opened on 23 March 1943. It was named after another young pilot, George Meeks, who died on the Reykjavík airfield. Patterson Field was closed after the war, but Meeks Field and the adjoining structures were returned to Iceland's control and were renamed Naval Air Station Keflavik, for the nearby town of Keflavík. In 1951, the U.S. military returned to the airport under a defence agreement between Iceland and the U.S. signed on 5 May 1951.^[5]

Development since the 1950s

With the reestablishment of the military air base at Keflavík during the 1950s, the air terminal found itself in the middle of a secure military zone. Travelers had to pass through military check points to reach their flights, until 1987, when the civilian terminal was relocated.^[6]

The presence of foreign military forces in Iceland under the NATO-sponsored Iceland–U.S. Defense Agreement of 1951 was controversial in Iceland, which had no military forces other than the Icelandic Coast Guard.^[7] During the 1960s and 1970s, rallies were held to protest the U.S. military presence in Iceland (and in particular at Keflavík), and every year protesters walked the 50-kilometre (30 mi) road from Reykjavík to Keflavík and chanted "Ísland úr NATO, herinn burt" (literally: Iceland out of NATO, the military away). The protests were not effective.

The two 3,000-metre-long (10,000 ft) and 60-metre-wide (200 ft) runways were large enough to support NASA's Space Shuttle as well as the Antonov An-225. On 29 June 1999, Concorde G-BOAA flew from Heathrow Airport to Reykjavík (Keflavik airport). The Concorde had been there earlier.^[8] The airport is also an important emergency landing runway for large aircraft in transatlantic operation in the ETOPS system, which requires aircraft to always have less than a certain flight time from a suitable landing site.^[9] The United States military base closed down in 2006.

The airport was used as a hub by WOW air until it ceased operations on 28 March 2019.^[10]

Passenger

Although the population of Iceland is only about 370,000, there are scheduled flights to and from numerous locations across North America and Europe. The largest carrier operating out of Keflavik is Icelandair. Play, which also uses Keflavik as a hub, is the second largest Icelandic carrier in 2022.^[3] WOW air was the second largest Icelandic carrier and the second largest at Keflavík, following its acquisition of Iceland Express on 23 October 2012,^[16] until it ceased operations on 28 March 2019.^[10] The airport only handles international flights; domestic flights are operated from Reykjavík's domestic airport.

The following airlines operate regular scheduled and charter services to and from Keflavík:^[17]

^1 Icelandair's service between Akureyri and Keflavík is available only to connecting passengers flying with the airline internationally.^[39]

Cargo

Passenger numbers

Busiest destinations

Busiest routes to/from Keflavik (2018)^[48]

Rank	Airport	Passengers	Operator(s)
1	Copenhagen	582,199	Icelandair, Play, SAS
2	London–Gatwick	467,032	easyJet, Icelandair, Norwegian, TUI Airways
3	Amsterdam	449,590	Icelandair, Transavia
4	Paris–Charles de Gaulle	443,312	Icelandair, Play
5	London–Heathrow	378,029	British Airways, Icelandair
6	Frankfurt	355,520	Icelandair, Lufthansa
7	Boston	330,792	Icelandair
8	Newark	327,046	Icelandair, United
9	New York–JFK	323,781	Delta, Icelandair
10	Oslo	313,713	Icelandair, Norwegian, SAS