Arturo Merino Benitez International Airport, located in Santiago, Chile, is Chile's largest aviation facility. It has the IATA Airport Code SCL.
The building is the hub for various Chilean airline companies such as Chile's largest national and international airline, Lan Chile, LanExpress, and the maligned Aerocontinente Chile which has been the subject of a drug trafficking investigation by Chilean police. It used to be a hub also for Ladeco, another major Chilean international airline.
No major airline accidents have happened there, but this didn't stop tragedy from knocking on the doors of this airport. During the 1970s, a plane chartered by an Argentinian rugby team from the Uruguay air force crashed in the Chilean side of the Andes while en route to this airport, leaving many people dead and many others to die days later. The survivors of the accident (who were travelling to Santiago to play a rugby match) and the stories of the things they experienced during those days when they were lost, became the subject of a 1992 Hollywood movie: Alive.
On October 2, 1996, AeroPeru Flight 603, a Boeing 757 that was enroute from Lima's Jorge Chavez International Airport to Santiago, Chile crashed in the waters of the Pacific Ocean. Everyone on board died.
Airlines serving Arturo Merino Benitez International Airport include:
