Complete story of the Kent Airport where a popular air show is making a return after a decade

Planes will once again take to the skies above Thanet’s Manston Airport in 2025 as an air show will be taking place at the former international airport for the first time in 10 years. Since its closure in 2014, discussions on re-opening the coastal airport have largely split opinions but now it seems Manston will be finally brought back to life in the near future.

Current plans would see the site revived as a new ‘state of the art freight hub’, more on this below. Alongside this, the airport is set to host the Manston International Airshow next August, which will be the first major aviation event to be held at the airport since 2013.

Scheduled to take place on Saturday, August 16 and Sunday, August 17, organisers promise plenty of aerial excitement for attendees to enjoy. Sharing the news on Facebook, the team behind the air show said: “We are thrilled to have you on board and to be able to start sharing with you what will be a spectacular event for Kent.

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“A show that we have been working on as a team since August and are delighted to confirm as a date for the diary.” Further details on the Manston International Airshow will be confirmed in due course.

As excitement builds for the newly announced air show and the re-opening of Manston Airport progresses, KentLive is taking a look back at the history of this iconic Thanet feature, from its construction to the path that now lies ahead. Here is the full story of Manston Airport:

Wartime origins

Having consistently made headlines since its closure in 2014, it may not come as a surprise that the origin of this east Kent airfield is also steeped in drama. The open farmland of Manston is said to have been used for emergency landings in the First World War, after planes had initially headed to St Mildred’s Bay in Westgate-on-Sea to find a landing strip.

The clifftop landing grounds had proven hazardous on numerous occasions, with one incident seeing a plane fail to stop before reaching the end of the cliffs and falling to the sea below - thankfully for the pilot it was during the inward tide.

Between the winter of 1915 and 1916, aircraft began using the open farmland between Minster and Manston for emergency landings, leading to the opening of Admiralty Aerodrome. In turn, a bomber training school opened, according to The Spitfire and Hurricane Memorial Museum - now located to one side of the runway.

RAF Manston then saw action again in the Second World War and the Battle of Britain thanks to its near-frontline position just a 10-minute flight from occupied France. RAF Manston is said to have borne the brunt of early Luftwaffe attacks in 1940 as a result and the museum claimed it had been a “dropping off” point for enemy planes to release unused bombs on their return home.

Despite this, stricken and damaged planes used RAF Manston to land in emergencies which led to its service as a recovery airfield for the RAF and USAAF. Notably, the airfield is also reported to have been used extensively in the trials for the bouncing bomb.

Hawker Hurricanes flew from the Kent runway in 1939 and Hawker Typhoons were based there later in the war. During the 1950s and amidst the turbulent atmosphere of the Cold War, Manston was used by the United States Air Force as a Strategic Air Command base for its fighter and fighter-bomber units.

After the USAF withdrew from Kent, Manston became a joint civilian and RAF airport in 1960 before becoming Kent International Airport in 1989. Military use at Manston ended in 1999 when the airport turned to solely civilian use from this point.

The rise and fall of Kent International Airport

In December 2003, the government earmarked Manston to "play a valuable role in meeting local demand and could contribute to regional economic development". Work began the following year in an attempt to make it a budget airline hub.

New car parks and a direct coach service from Bluewater, via Chatham, were introduced to support new flights to UK destinations such as Manchester and Edinburgh, as well as international flights to Dublin and Geneva.

But after its primary airline went into administration, Manston Airport went into liquidation and operations were temporarily ceased until a new buyer could be found. A sale to Infratil, based in New Zealand, was completed in August 2005; in July 2006, a charter route between Manston and Norfolk, Virginia was announced.

However, this was cancelled due to a low number of bookings in a sign of the struggles the airport was experiencing. Despite a number of new services being added over the next few years, it was still proving financially unviable.

Kent International was placed up for sale after Infratil's annual report showed that losses from its European airports grew from £9 million to £11 million in 2010. In July 2012, a pressure group Why Not Manston? was formed, aiming to support greater use of Manston Airport.

A company owned by Ann Cloag - who co-founded the Stagecoach group - took ownership of the former airport on 29 November 2013 for the sum of £1 . Eventually, in March 2014, it was announced that a 45-day consultation period into the closure of the former airport had begun.

Daily losses were said to be £10,000 and Manston’s last scheduled flight departed for Amsterdam in April 2014 - with 144 people losing their jobs. Thanet North MP Sir Roger Gale called the decision an "act of corporate vandalism".

Revival and obstacles

There were plans for the site to be developed into 4,000 homes, a business park, country park and sports village, as well as retaining some of the airport as a heritage runway. Talk of this ultimately fell on the backburner.

From 2015, the site saw a new lease of life as an emergency lorry park to help manage cross-channel problems during peak periods. Though the site was purchased by RiverOak Strategic Partners (RSP) in 2019, for a reported £16 million price tag, until 2022 it seemed unlikely that Manston would serve flights ever again.

However, following years of delays and challenges from local campaign groups, the UK Government finally granted permission for the airport to be redeveloped as a cargo hub in August 2022. The renovation of Manston will reportedly cost around £500million and will include new terminals and updated runways.

Several attempts to prevent the development of the airfreight hub have since caused further delays. In September last year, an application to quash the Government’s approval for the Manston Airport Development Consent Order (DCO) was dismissed.

A further attempt to halt development of the cargo hub by appealing against the Manston DCO decision spearheaded by a Ramsgate resident and campaigner was dismissed earlier this year in May - paving the way for work to begin to re-open the airport. The judgement issued by Lord Justice Peter Jackson, Lord Justice Lewis and Lord Justice Warby allows RSP to begin work to recruit staff both for the construction phase and for operational roles once the airport is ready to re-open.

The future

Planning, construction, recruitment and the completion of the airspace change project is anticipated to take three years to complete – with the airport ready to receive flights in 2027. Though plans will see Manston serve purely as a cargo hub to begin with, there are rumoured talks that passenger flights could be on the cards from 2028.

The Mirror reports that, should the cargo side of the airport prove successful, passenger routes to countries like the Netherlands, Spain, Cyprus and Malta could be launched. The airport's owners are said to be in talks with budget airlines such as Ryanair and easyJet.

Looking further ahead, plans over a 15-year period include having up to four passenger stands and 19 freight stands. RSP has said the project will create around 650 new jobs during the building process and 2,000 permanent jobs when it is fully re-opened.

Their website added: "The project requires no Government funding and has attracted several international investors who are prepared to invest £800m in this deprived part of the country."