You may have been to the Raleigh-Durham International Airport and noticed that it also goes by another name, RDU. Or maybe you’ve been to Danville Regional Airport and noticed that it is also known as KDAN. Where do these codes come from and how do they work?
Raleigh-Durham International Airport can definitely be a mouthful and an inconvenience to passengers. However, when it comes to airlines, they can actually lose money from this. Just having to print extra words on a boarding ticket can be a waste. (Mitchell, 2024) As a result, airlines use three-letter codes determined by the International Air Transport Association (IATA). But, there is also the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) airport codes, a byproduct of the United Nations. How does the standarization work and whats the difference between ICAO and IATA? And to top everything off, how does the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) LID (location identifier) work?
To fully understand three different codes, lets look at one airport: Manassas Regional Airport Passengers tend to refer to airports by their IATA code, in this case, it is “MNZ” However, if you are a pilot, you will use the FAA’s LID, “HEF”. The code HEF comes from the name of the airport, Harry P. Davis Field. ICAO uses the letter K to identify the location in the United States. This makes the ICAO code KMNZ. (Crider, 2024)
ICAO have different first letter identifiers based on the region of the world you are in. All airports in the central United States have the letter “K”. So the ICAO code for Atlanta would KATL.
To wrap everything up, lets play a little game with our Danville Regional Airport: IATA codes tend to be the name of the airport so the code in this case would be…DAN. The ICAO code utilizes the fire letter prefix. So in this case the code would be….KDAN. And to make everything easy, the FAA’s code is also the same as IATA…DAN
At the end of the day, IATA airport codes are the main codes used for your daily passengers and airlines. They are especially important when there are multiple airports in a single area like New York. However, there also happens to be ICAO and FAA codes typically used for government work.
