Suvarnabhumi Airport
Facts on BKK
Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport opened in 2006 as a brand-new facility, but it simply inherited the code BKK from the older Don Mueang Airport once Don Mueang stopped handling international flights.
Source: Wikipedia - Suvarnabhumi Airport
Suvarnabhumi comes from the Sanskrit suvarna (gold) and bhumi (land): the "land of gold" named in ancient Indian literature and Buddhist texts, a golden kingdom thought to lie east of the Ganges and, by Thai tradition, somewhere on Thailand's central coastal plains.
Source: Wikipedia
The airport was tentatively called Nong Nguhao after the marshy site. The name Suvarnabhumi was chosen by King Bhumibol Adulyadej, whose own name contains the same element, bhumi, and the government picked it to celebrate the claim that the legendary golden land lay in Thailand.
Source: Wikipedia
Suvarnabhumi's air-traffic control tower stands 132.2 meters tall and was the world's tallest free-standing airport control tower from 2006 to 2014, before being surpassed by a tower at Kuala Lumpur's airport.
Source: Wikipedia - Suvarnabhumi Airport
Helmut Jahn's terminal roof is cantilevered in a wavelike form so it appears to float over the concourse, a nod to the water that had to be drained from the site. Eight composite trusses of 2,710 tons each carry the canopy.
Source: Wikipedia
Suvarnabhumi opened at 03:00 on 28 September 2006, taking over every flight from Don Mueang overnight. The first arrival was a Lufthansa Cargo flight from Mumbai at 03:05; the first passenger departure was an Aerosvit service to Kyiv around 05:30.
Source: Wikipedia
Construction was delayed partly because the airport was found to be built over an old graveyard, and superstitious workers reported seeing ghosts. On 23 September 2005 the Thai airport authority held a ceremony at which 99 Buddhist monks chanted to appease the spirits.
Source: Wikipedia
The airport covers 3,520 hectares (8,700 acres) and cost an estimated 155 billion baht. At 563,000 square metres, its main passenger terminal was, when built, the world's largest ever constructed in a single phase.
Source: Wikipedia
Suvarnabhumi handled 62,234,693 passengers in 2024. As of 2025 it was served by 113 airlines, more than any other airport in the world, which is why so many Asia-Europe and Asia-Oceania itineraries route through Bangkok.
Source: Wikipedia
Inside the terminal stands a large sculptural depiction of the Samudra manthana, the Hindu myth of the churning of the Ocean of Milk, in which gods and demons pull a serpent back and forth like a tug-of-war rope to produce the elixir of immortality.
Source: Wikipedia
Airports of Thailand opened the Sky Lane in December 2015, a free 23.5 km controlled-access cycling track looping the airport perimeter with no motor traffic at all. It is the longest such track in Asia, and King Vajiralongkorn presided over its formal opening in 2018.
Source: Wikipedia