Gbadolite Airport guide

Gbadolite Airport serves Gbadolite, the capital of Nord-Ubangi Province in the north of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It sits at the village of Moanda, about 6 km southwest of the city. The IATA code is BDT and the ICAO code is FZFD. The field lies at 457 m above sea level.

President Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire had the airport built so that Air France Concorde jets could be chartered to carry him to Paris and other destinations. That purpose explains the scale of the field. Its single asphalt runway, 07/25, is about 3,200 m long, among the longest airstrips in Africa, and it lies in rainforest far from any large city.

Today the airport works as a small domestic airfield. Scheduled traffic is limited to a few flights a week from Kinshasa. Road travel to Gbadolite from elsewhere is described as difficult at best, although roads in the town itself are in good shape. The runway is equipped with a VOR/DME beacon on the field, ident BLT, and an NDB with the same ident about 9.6 km to the east-northeast. Travellers should confirm flight times before travelling.