San Francisco International Airport is a major international airport located south of downtown San Francisco, California, United States, adjacent to the cities of Millbrae and San Bruno in unincorporated San Mateo County. It is often referred to as SFO. The airport has flights to destinations throughout the Americas and is a major gateway to Europe, Asia, and Australasia-Oceania.
San Francisco International Airport is the largest airport in the San Francisco Bay Area, and is the second busiest airport in the state of California after Los Angeles International Airport. As of 2006, San Francisco International Airport is the thirteenth largest in the United States and the twenty-third largest airport in the world, in terms of passengers. It is a major hub of United Airlines and is Virgin America's principal base of operations. It is the sole maintenance hub of United Airlines. SFO is also a focus city for Alaska Airlines.
SFO has numerous passenger amenities, including a wide range of food and drink establishments, shopping, baggage storage, public showers, a medical clinic, and assistance for lost or stranded travelers and military personnel. The airport hosts the Louis A. Turpen Aviation Museum, the San Francisco Airport Commission Aviation Library, and both permanent and temporary art exhibitions in several places in the terminals. Public Wi-Fi is available throughout most of the terminal area, provided by T-Mobile for a fee.
The U.S. Weather Bureau began keeping weather observations at Mills Field in May 1927. The weather records have continued under the National Weather Service, which maintained the Bay Area forecast office in the airport's control tower building until forecasting was moved to Redwood City. Although not the official weather observation site for San Francisco (with the official site existing in Duboce Park), data from SFO's automated weather station often appears as belonging to "San Francisco" in media sources outside of the Bay Area.
United Airlines used the Mills Field airport as well as the Oakland Municipal Airport for its services throughout the 1930s.
Starting in 1935, Pan American World Airways used the facility as the terminal for its "China Clipper" flying boat service across the Pacific Ocean. Domestic flights did not begin en masse, however, until World War II, when Oakland International Airport was taken over by the military and its passenger flights were shifted to San Francisco.
After the war, United Airlines used the Pan Am terminal for its flights to Hawaii. It has grown to become one of five United Airlines hubs and SFO is home of United's largest maintenance facility.
In 1954, the airport's Central Passenger Terminal opened for passenger service. Jet service to SFO began in the late 1950s: United built a large maintenance facility at San Francisco for its new Douglas DC-8s. In July 1959 the first jetway bridge was installed in the United States.
SFO has expanded continuously through the decades. Most recently, a new $1 billion international terminal opened in December 2000, replacing Terminal 2 as the international terminal. This new terminal contains a world-class aviation library and museum. SFO’s long-running program of cultural exhibits, now called the San Francisco Airport Museums, won unprecedented accreditation by the American Association of Museums in 1999.
A long-planned extension of the Bay Area Rapid Transit system to the airport opened on June 22, 2003, allowing passengers to board trains directly at the airport's international terminal bound for San Francisco or points in the East Bay. In 2003, the AirTrain shuttle system opened, conveying passengers between terminals, parking lots, the SFO BART station, and the rental car center on small automatic trains.
It is not uncommon for SFO to experience significant delays in adverse weather, when only one of the airport's four runways can be used at a time, due to a lateral separation of only 750 feet between runways. Airport planners have floated proposals to extend the airport's runways further into San Francisco Bay in order to accommodate the next generation of super-jumbo aircraft. In order to expand further into the bay, the airport would be required by law to restore bay land elsewhere in the Bay Area to offset the fill. Such proposals have nevertheless met resistance with environmental groups, fearing damage to the habitat of animals living near the airport and bay water quality.
As such, SFO suffers from loss of service as many airlines, especially as low-cost carriers increasingly shift service to the other two major Bay Area airports at Oakland and San Jose, which continue to expand for the time being. However, SFO has more land connections compared to Oakland and San Jose, being directly connected to U.S. Route 101, Interstate 380, and the BART system.
Recently, recovery at SFO has been evident. Spirit Airlines and Qantas began service to SFO in 2006. United Airlines reinstated non-stop service to Seoul and Taipei on June 7, 2007. In addition, SFO has become the base of operations for start-up airline Virgin America. In March 2007, Air China increased the frequency of the Beijing-San Francisco service from 5 times weekly to daily, with plans to increase to two daily. Also Air China is to begin operations from Shanghai Pudong International Airport during March 2009. In 2007, JetBlue Airways and Irish airline Aer Lingus began service, while Southwest Airlines returned after pulling out in May 2001 citing high costs and delays.
A global warming study unveiled in February 2007 revealed that much of SFO would be under water with only a one-meter rise in sea levels.
In April 2007, SFO announced plans to introduce a registered traveler program that would allow travelers to speed through the TSA security checkpoint in about 30 seconds.
Baggage and passenger screening is operated by Covenant Aviation Security, a TSA contractor, nicknamed "Team SFO." SFO was the first airport in the United States to integrate in-line baggage screening into its baggage-handling system and has been a model for other airports in the post-9/11 era.
On October 4, 2007, an Airbus A380 jumbo jet made its first visit and test flight to the airport.
On July 14, 2008 SFO was voted Best International Airport in North America 2008 in the World Airports Survey by Skytrax.
SFO was one of the first airports to implement a Fly Quiet Program which grades individual air carriers on their performance on noise abatement procedures while flying in and out of SFO. The Jon C. Long Fly Quiet Program is an initiative implemented by the Aircraft Noise Abatement Office to encourage individual airlines to operate as quietly as possible at SFO. The program promotes a participatory approach in complying with the noise abatement procedures.
SFO was also one of the first U.S. airports to conduct a residential sound abatement retrofitting program. Established by the FAA in the early 1980s, this program evaluated the cost effectiveness of reducing interior sound levels for homes in the vicinity of the airport, or more particularly homes within the 65 CNEL noise contour surface. The program made use of a noise computer model to predict improvement in specific residential interiors for a variety of different noise control strategies. This pilot program was conducted for a neighborhood in the city of South San Francisco, and success was achieved in all of the homes analyzed. The construction costs turned out to be modest, and the post-construction interior sound level tests confirmed the model predictions for noise abatement. To date over $137 million has been spent to insulate in excess of 15,000 homes throughout the neighboring cities of Daly City, Pacifica, San Bruno, and South San Francisco.
The airport is composed of four terminals (1, 2, 3, and International) and seven concourses (A through G) arranged in a ring. Terminal 1 (Boarding Areas B and C), Terminal 3 (Boarding Areas E and F), and the International Terminal (Boarding Area A) handle domestic flights. The International Terminal (Boarding Areas A and G) handle international flights and some domestic flights. Terminal 2 (Boarding Area D) is undergoing renovations, which will be completed in 2010.
Note: Flights to and from Canada depart from and arrive in the domestic terminals, because they clear U.S. Customs at their Canadian originating airports through a border preclearance arrangement. JetBlue Airways and Virgin America depart from International Terminal Boarding Area A.
Formerly known as the South Terminal, Terminal 1 consists of Boarding Area B and Boarding Area C. A third boarding area, Rotunda A, was demolished in 2007.
Boarding Area B has 18 gates: 20-31, 32-32B, 33-36
Note: All Northwest Airlines domestic flights depart from Terminal 1 Boarding Area C and all Northwest international flights depart and arrive at International Terminal Boarding Area A.
Boarding Area C has nine gates: 40-48
When completed, Virgin America will be the primary tenant and Boarding Area D will have 14 gates. JetBlue and Southwest Airlines are possible tenants.
Formerly known as the North Terminal, Terminal 3 is made up of Boarding Area E and Boarding Area F. This terminal is utilized by Air Canada, Midwest Airlines, American Airlines, and United Airlines, with the final two accounting for 10.2% and 48.9% of SFO's passenger traffic, respectively.
Boarding Area F has 25 gates: 68-72, 73-73A, 74-76, 77-77A, 78-86, 87-87A, 88-90.
SFO's international terminal, designed by Craig W. Hartman and opened in December 2000 to replace International Departures from Terminal 2, is the largest international terminal in North America, and is the largest building in the world built on base isolators to protect against earthquakes. Following the theme in other SFO terminals, food service focuses on quick service versions of leading Bay Area restaurants. SFO planners attempted to make the airport a destination in and of itself, not just for travelers that are passing through. The international terminal is a common use facility, with all gates and all ticketing areas shared among the international airliners. All international arrivals and departures are handled here (except flights from cities with customs preclearance).
The airport BART station is also located in this terminal, at the garage leading to Boarding Area G.
All the gates in this terminal have two jetway bridges with the exception of gate A2, which only has one jetway; gates A1, A3, and A11 are capable of accommodating two aircraft. Six gates are specifically designed for the Airbus A380, making SFO one of the first airports in the world with such gates when it was constructed in 2000.
For lack of space, the terminal was constructed on top of the airport's main access road at enormous expense, completing the continuous "ring" of terminals. As a consequence, the terminal required its own elaborate set of ramps to connect it with Highway 101.
The design and construction of the international terminal is owed to Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Del Campo & Maru Architects, Michael Willis Associates (main terminal building), Hellmuth, Obata and Kassabaum (Boarding Area G) & Gerson/Overstreet Architects (Boarding Area A). The contracts were awarded after an architectural design competition.
If all gates in an airlines' designated international boarding area are full, passengers will board or deplane from the opposite international boarding area.
Despite the terminal's name, JetBlue Airways and Virgin America serve domestic destinations using this terminal from Boarding Area A. Passengers arriving on domestic and pre-cleared Canadian flights into the International Terminal claim their baggage in a separate area outside of customs and immigrations.
Boarding Area A has 13 gates: A1-A10, A11-A11A, A12
Note
Boarding Area G has 15 gates: G91, G92-G92A, G93-G98, G99-G99A, G100, G101-G101A, G102
Numerous door-to-door van, airporter, limousine, hotel courtesy, and charter operators service the airport. Taxis, along with the aforementioned services, stop at the center island transportation island on the arrivals/baggage claim level of the airport.
In addition, China Airlines operates bus services to SFO from Milpitas and Cupertino.
The airport provides both short-term and long-term parking facilities. Short term parking is located in the central terminal area and two international terminal garages. Long term parking is located on South Airport Blvd. and San Bruno Ave. and are served by shuttle buses.
Passengers can also park long-term at a select number of BART stations, that have parking lots, with a permit purchased online in advance.
On December 24, 1964, Flying Tiger Line Flight 282, a Lockheed Constellation cargo aircraft departing for New York City, crashed in the hills west of the airport, killing all three crewmembers onboard.
On July 30, 1971, Pan Am Flight 845, a Boeing 747 (registration: N747PA, name: Clipper America), struck navigational aids at the end of runway 1R on takeoff for Tokyo. The aircraft's landing gear was damaged, and the flight proceeded out over the Pacific Ocean to dump fuel in order to reduce weight for an emergency landing. Emergency services were deployed at the airport, and the plane returned and landed on runway 28R, using only the landing gear on one side of the aircraft. As the gear partially collapsed, the aircraft skidded into the dirt area next to the runway and came to a stop, but there was no fire. The aircraft was successfully evacuated using emergency slides. There were no fatalities among the 218 passengers and crew aboard, but there were a number of injuries, some serious. An investigation determined the cause of the accident to be erroneous information from the flight dispatcher to the crew regarding weight and runway length.
On February 19, 1985, China Airlines Flight 006, en route from Taipei to Los Angeles, lost power over the Pacific in one of its four engines. The pilots of the Boeing 747SP aircraft failed to trim the plane to counteract the asymmetric thrust condition, despite having several minutes to do so. The aircraft eventually rolled over and dived a total of 30,000 feet before being brought under control and diverted to SFO.
On June 28, 1998, United Airlines Flight 863, a Boeing 747-400, cleared nearby San Bruno Mountain by only 100 feet after a pilot erred in correcting for a failed engine during takeoff.
On January 31, 2000, Alaska Airlines Flight 261 lost control and crashed into the Pacific Ocean near Los Angeles, killing all 88 people on board while en route to SFO.
On September 11, 2001, United Airlines Flight 93 was hijacked and crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania while en route to SFO.
On May 26, 2007, a SkyWest Airlines jet almost crashed into a Republic Airlines jet on the runways at San Francisco airport, with the newly developed AMASS system helping avoid a runway collision for the first time since its inauguration in 2001.
On January 13, 2008, an empty United Airlines Boeing 757 aircraft, being pushed back to the maintenance hangar, backed into a SkyWest Airlines regional jet pushing back for departure near Gates 79 and 80. No one was injured, but both planes sustained damage to their tails and engines.
On June 28, 2008 an ABX Air Boeing 767 preparing to depart with cargo caught fire and was seriously damaged. The pilots escaped uninjured. The airline had received a threat the week before, but thus far investigations have revealed no evidence of any malicious device on board.
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