In 2024, Amiens – Henry Potez International Airport turned 17. It is France’s newest airport hub. No new complete infrastructure dedicated to air transport has been built in France since its official inauguration on 30 June 2007. Flashback on the highlights leading up to the first landing of a BELUGA.

It all began in July 1988. Under the management of Jacques Crusson, the AEROSPATIALE plant at Méaulte became a unit specializing in small mechanical parts and the automated production of sub-assemblies, and this led to the project to automate the construction of the nose fuselage for the AIRBUS range. At that time, as a logical extension of this expertise, we began to think about the future of the plant with regard to the nose fuselages of the new A 380s and A 400 Ms. An important point was that these structures could not, or only with great difficulty, be transported to Saint-Nazaire by road. Fernand Demilly, former Director of the plant’s School and Vocational Training Centre, and also Chairman of the Somme Departmental Council, was concerned about this important constraint.

At the time, the plant had more than 80 years of aeronautical experience behind it, dating back to Henry Potez. It had a workforce of 3,000, including subcontractors, in particular those working for PHMA, the Albert Hydraulics and Mechanics Centre, a group of 25 SMEs at the time. Nearby, there were two aviation clubs, for planes and gliders.

In order to face the future with economic security, it was essential to equip the aero-industrial center with a runway that would enable it to join the European network of AIRBUS BELUGA cargo aircraft. In fact, the first meeting to envisage such construction took place on 20 October 1997, and was chaired by Préfet Dufeigneux and attended by Fernand Demilly. Over the next six years, numerous meetings were held in Méaulte and Amiens, as well as in Toulouse, Nantes, Saint-Nazaire, Paris and Brussels.
Finally, the memorandum of understanding for the construction of the runway was signed on 27 November 2003 by all the partners at the Théâtre du Jeu de Paume in Albert. The financing amounted to 40 million Euros of which the AIRBUS Group was to contribute 11.25%.
Then came the numerous studies and administrative procedures. Hubert Flandre became Director of SMER, the Syndicat Mixte d’Etudes et de Réalisation, which brought together the Département and the Pays du Coquelicot, setting June 2007 as the target opening date for the runway.
A few figures will give you an idea of the scale of this project: 200 hectares of land were bought to create the site for the 2,200-metre long, 45-metre wide runway. The compulsory decontamination phase uncovered seven tons of shells, and 16 soldiers’ bodies from the First World War, and work started in January 2006 to deal with two million cubic meters of discarded matter inside nine kilometers of fencing.
On completion of this, the airport was inaugurated on 30 June 2007. Ten years after the initial plans had been drawn up, BELUGA cargo flights could begin.