Daugavpils

55°56'33"N 026°40'07"E

Runway: 02/20 - 2500x46meters/8202x...feet - concrete (main runway closed, 1000x23meters usable on secondary runway)

Air field Daugavpils (Latvian: Lidosta Daugavpils, Russian: Аэропорт Лоцики-1 Даугавпипс, ICAO: EVDA) is an airfield east of Daugavpils 190 kilometers southwest of Riga, and 5 kilometes northeast of Daugavpils, Latvia.
The airfield was built by the Soviet Union as air base Lotsiki-1 'Daugavpils'.
The air base was abandoned in 1993 by the Soviet Union after Latvia gained independence in 1991. The last known Soviet Air Force unit to have been stationed at the base was 372 APIB (372nd Fighter-Bomber Aviation Regiment) flying MiG-23 and MiG-27 'Flogger' aircraft from 1977 until 1993.
Between 1994 and 2006 the airfield was owned by a private investor, who did nothing with the airfield. It was then sold to the city of Daugavpils. Latvia and the city of Daugavpils are working on a rebuild of the airfield, which had been completely stripped from all usable materials. Only the brick and concrete of the buildings and runways was left standing. Originally, plans existed to have the airfield rnnng by 2013. The Financial Crisis prevented this and the timetable has slipped indefinately. Once reconstruction is completed it is to be known as Daugavpils International Airport (Latvian: Daugavpils Starptautiska Lidosta), for which a Limited Liabillity Company was set up by the government in order to attract investors.

Due to Daugavpils' large Russian and Polish communities scheduled flights to Moscow and Poland are expected to give the airfield a healthy start. The airfield is owned by the Latvian Airport Authority and since 2007 it allows the use of 1000x23meters of runway, located on what used to be the secondary runway of the airbase.
Many of the former airbase buildings are still standing, albeit abandoned and in a very bad shape. Some of the barracks are now used to house Latvian people.


The abandoned Daugavpils Air Base in 2006


Daugavpils Air Base in 2010. The airfield had been reopened in 2007, after a new 1000m runway had been painted out over the former taxiway/parking/emergency runway