March 28, 2001
Regular operations began for Athens International Airport (AIA) Eleftherios Venizelos in Greece. This airport serves the Greek administrative region of Attica, including the country’s capital city of Athens. AIA is specifically located in Spata, a municipal unit that is 12 miles (20 kilometers) east of downtown Athens.
The airport was named in honor of a renowned statesman. Eleftherios Venizelos was a leader of the Greek national liberation movement; he served a total of eight terms as prime minister of Greece between 1910 and 1933. Venizelos is still widely known today as the Maker of Modern Greece. The airport bearing his name replaced the Attica-based Ellinikon International Airport, which first went into service in 1938 and shut down on the same day that its successor was officially opened.
This debut of AIA was reported across the globe. “Athens’ $3-Billion Airport Welcomes First Flight,” announced a large headline in the Canadian newspaper Edmonton Journal. That pioneering Olympic Airways flight was departed from Toronto and – after stopping in Montreal – landed at AIA at 3:00 p.m. on March 28. “We thought we were going to land at the old airport, but they held us back a few hours so we could the first,” recounted passenger and Toronto native Kostas Dedes. “This airport is beautiful, of world standards.”
In its coverage of the AIA’s opening, the Associated Press (AP) highlighted a major event in Greece that was just a few years away. This AP news story stated, “More than 12 million tourists visit Greece every year and the government said the airport will help handle the increased traffic during the 2004 Olympic games in Athens.”
An inaugural ceremony for AIA was held on the day before the start of operations at this airport. Costas Simitis, who was prime minister of Greece from 1996 to 1996, officiated at the ceremony. As of 2024, AIA was the 16th busiest airport in all of Europe. In addition, its is second only to Istanbul Airport in Turkey as both the busiest and largest airport in the Balkans.
Photo Credit: Apaleutos25 (Giorgos Vodouris), licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike International license at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en
For more information on Athens International Airport Elefttherios Venizelos, please check out https://arete-publica.com/home_en/industries-en-2/athens-international-airport-aia/ and https://www.alternativeairlines.com/athens-international-airport
Transportation History 
I have no idea how pilots can see the runways of airports surrounded by a big city.
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