The World Cup, the world’s largest sporting event, is set to kick off next month, and more than half a million fervent soccer fans are poised to descend on host country Brazil. Of that total, 11 percent are expected to arrive on business aircraft, and estimates call for approximately 3,000 business aircraft to be operating in the country during the month-long tournament, which begins on June 12. Such numbers will place a heavy strain on Brazil’s aviation services. “Many of the airports in the country are already overcrowded, so adding more general aviation aircraft to the mix will not help the situation,” said a spokesman from World Fuel Services’ BaseOps global flight support division. “To counter this, some military bases are being used for VIP travel.”
With the matches spread out around Brazil, airports in the host cities will be subject to a slot system for the duration of the tournament. “Slots might be required at secondary airports where they are currently not required, and that will depend primarily on the number of requests the airport gets,” said Christine Vamvakas, operations communications manager with Universal Weather & Aviation. “The biggest thing is to make sure that operators are submitting their requests now.”
