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Hawarden Airport , often known as '''Chester Airport''', is a small airport in Hawarden in north east Wales . It is situated 3.5 Nautical Mile s (6.5 km) west southwest of the city of Chester , which lies across the border in England . The airport is owned and operated by BAE Systems . A long term tenancy agreement has been signed with Airbus UK , giving rights as the sole operator of the site. At the airport there is a large Airbus factory which produces aircraft wings and also a Raytheon aircraft factory. The aircraft factory located on the airfield is known as the Broughton factory, named after the nearest village. Hawarden Aerodrome has a CAA Ordinary Licence (Number P786) that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction as authorised by the licensee (Airbus UK Limited) Civil Aviation Authority Aerodrome Ordinary Licences . HISTORY The aircraft factory at Hawarden was established during the second world war as a ''Shadow Factory'' for Vickers-Armstrongs Limited. The factory produced 5,540 Vickers Wellingtons and 235 Avro Lancasters . Post-war the factory was used by Vickers to build 28,000 aluminium bungalows. The RAF's No.48 Maintenance Unit was formed at Hawarden on 1.9.39 and until 1.7.57 stored, maintained and scrapped many thousands of military aircraft, latterly including Halifaxes, Wellingtons, Horsa gliders and DH Mosquitos. No.3 Ferry Pilots Pool/Ferry Pool, Air Transport Auxiliary, was based at Hawarden between 5.11.40 and 30.11.45. Its veteran pilots ferried thousands of military aircraft from the factories and maintenance facilities at Hawarden and elsewhere to and from RAF and Naval squadrons throughout the UK. On 1 July 1948 The De Havilland Aircraft Company took over the Vickers factory and over the years built the following aircraft types:
The company became part of Hawker Siddeley Aviation in the 1960s and the production of the Hawker Siddeley HS125 business jet, designed by De Havilland, became the main aircraft type produced by the factory for nearly forty years. Production was moved to the United States when the 125 business was sold to the Raytheon Corporation . Raytheon still have a 125 support centre on the airfield. Since the early 1970s the Broughton factory became the centre of wing production for all the Airbus aircraft. Raytheon System open a new facility in 2003, to support the Bombardier Sentinel R1 entering service with the Royal Air Force . AIRLINES AND DESTINATIONS Scheduled passenger flights to the airport are rare; most flights are chartered, or corporate, but the airport has frequent air freight flights provided by the Airbus Beluga to transport aircraft wings to Toulouse for Airbus . Sometimes the Beluga flies to Hamburg Finkenwerder. There are also regular Eastern Airways Jetstream 41 shuttle flights to Bristol Filton for Airbus workers and there are PrivatAir A319s that operate passenger services to Toulouse and Hamburg on behalf of Airbus. A number of privately owned light aircraft are based at Hawarden. Police aircraft also operate from here. There is a lot of private and general activity at the airport, adding considerably to the number of aircraft movements at this airport. Operators include Hawarden Air Services, which provides air taxi/charter services, Chester Flying School, HeliAdventure Chester, and Cheshire Police base one helicopter at the airfield. REFERENCES
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