St Helena got an airport: Where to now for one of Earth’s remotest places?

It’s not news, but it will be news to many. The remote island of St Helena and its tiny pop­u­la­tion got a USD 380 mil­lion air­port. That was shortly before the glob­al COVID shutdowns. 

While St Helena Air­port (HLE) has yet to deliv­er on its tour­ism and eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment poten­tial, Mar­cella Mit­tens and many oth­er ‘Saints’ remain hopeful. 

Ms Mit­tens writes this “Good Tour­ism” Insight at the invit­a­tion of Tourism’s Hori­zon: Travel for the Mil­lions, a “GT” Insight Partner.

St Helena: ‘a breath of fresh air’

Few people know much about St Helena; one of the most remote islands on earth. The one thing many people do know is that Napo­leon Bona­parte was exiled here — in 1815, for the last six years of his life — pre­cisely due to its remoteness. 

Today, tiny St Helena con­tin­ues to nav­ig­ate the com­plex chal­lenge of bal­an­cing tour­ism devel­op­ment with the pre­ser­va­tion of its unique cul­ture and environment. 

St Helena has a pop­u­la­tion of only 4,048 people, on a tiny land­mass of just 122 square kilo­metres. The island is part of the Brit­ish Over­seas Ter­rit­ory of Saint Helena, Ascen­sion, and Tristan da Cunha, but few Brit­ish people know of its existence. 

St Helena is as off-the-beaten-track as you can get; a unique loc­a­tion with an evolving cul­ture influ­enced by Europe, Asia, and Africa. The vol­can­ic, trop­ic­al island with its moun­tain­ous ter­rain and micro-cli­mates is loc­ated in the South Atlantic Ocean, and is home to a rich and unique her­it­age, both nat­ur­al and built. 

The island’s tour­ism slo­gan, ‘a breath of fresh air’, con­veys St Helen­a’s deep con­nec­tion with the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment as well as its new­ness in the tour­ism marketplace.

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Far, far away … by sea or by air?

At the centre of St Helena’s story — both past and present — lies its geo­graphy. Since the island’s dis­cov­ery in 1502 by the Por­tuguese (the island was unin­hab­ited), St Helena has only been access­ible by sea. 

Under Brit­ish rule, the Roy­al Mail Ship (RMS) St Helena was the main source of trans­port­a­tion, mak­ing monthly jour­neys from Cape Town, South Africa until its ser­vice ended in 2018.

With that known, in 2002 the islanders were offered a dra­mat­ic choice: invest in a new ship to replace the RMS St Helena, or build an air­port to con­nect St Helena to the world.

The pro­spect of air travel sent rever­ber­a­tions — mostly pos­it­ive — through the island. A vig­or­ous debate pre­ceded a vote through which the islanders over­whelm­ingly elec­ted to build an air­port; in no small part due to the pos­sib­il­it­ies for a tour­ism industry. 

The UK Depart­ment for Inter­na­tion­al Devel­op­ment (since replaced by the For­eign, Com­mon­wealth & Devel­op­ment Office) spent GBP 285.5 mil­lion (~USD 380 mil­lion) on design­ing and build­ing St Helena Air­port (IATA: HLE, ICAO: FHSH), which opened in 2016. 

Ten years of sub­sidy was provided for, but after that the air­port must break even. Tour­ism is key to meet­ing the loom­ing deadline. 

Don’t miss oth­er “GT” con­tent tagged ‘avi­ation and air travel’

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Apprehension

There were con­cerns around build­ing an air­port for St Helena: 

Some islanders were fond of being served by the RMS St Helena. The Roy­al Mail ves­sel was a unique cul­tur­al icon integ­ral to island life. 

Some feared the cul­tur­al change that could ensue. Islanders appre­ci­ate the ‘unlocked door’ cul­ture of their close-knit com­munity. Many expressed wor­ries that the island was not ‘ready’ for the poten­tial influx of tour­ists and increased trade. 

Also, the insist­ence of the UK gov­ern­ment to fully fund St Helena Air­port rather than let private investors in was cri­ti­cised by some. The private investors seemed to be more ambi­tious about estab­lish­ing dir­ect routes, includ­ing to Lon­don, that would have opened up St Helen­a’s tour­ism poten­tial even further. 

Now, it is fair to say, some regret the decisions made. 

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Hope

Islanders hoped, and con­tin­ue to hope, that tour­ism activ­it­ies facil­it­ated by St Helena Air­port will lead to self-suf­fi­ciency rather than depend­ency, with tour­ism rev­en­ues pay­ing for neces­sary imports. Tour­ists would also grow the mar­ket for St Helena’s artis­an­al products, such as its dis­tinct­ive cof­fee and unique honey. 

For St Helena’s busi­nesses, pre­par­ing for this trans­form­a­tion­al change meant invest­ing in accom­mod­a­tion, trans­port, and infra­struc­ture, includ­ing an app that enables cur­rency exchange (St Helena issues its own St Helena pounds, par­al­lel to UK sterling). 

And the pro­spect of an air­port for St Helena was nev­er only about tourism. 

It was thought St Helena Air­port could bring oth­er bene­fits such as improved access to med­ic­al ser­vices, and gen­er­ate new employ­ment pro­spects for young people who ten­ded to leave for pas­tures new, leav­ing behind an aging pop­u­la­tion. In that respect the air­port could make St Helena more sus­tain­able socially as well as economically.

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Delay and disaster

After a one-year delay due to safety con­cerns, South Africa’s Air­link began oper­at­ing a weekly com­mer­cial six-hour flight to and from Johan­nes­burg in 2017, repla­cing a jour­ney that pre­vi­ously took five days by sea from Cape Town. 

St Helena Air­port also sea­son­ally serves flights to and from Cape Town as well as to and from the inter­est­ingly named Wide­awake Air­field on Ascen­sion Island.

Then dis­aster struck: COVID-19.

Because St Helena Air­port had opened just a few short years before the pan­dem­ic, there was very little ‘run­way’ for com­mer­cial avi­ation ser­vices to be estab­lished, let alone the aspir­ing tour­ism busi­nesses on the island. 

Some entre­pren­eurs struggled to cov­er the loans they had taken out to devel­op their busi­nesses. High expect­a­tions were dashed.

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Where to from here? 

Now, post-COV­ID, St Helena stands at a crossroads. 

While the open­ing of St Helena Air­port once prom­ised a surge in tour­ism and eco­nom­ic oppor­tun­ity, the anti­cip­ated boom has yet to mater­i­al­ise. Lim­ited flight avail­ab­il­ity, high travel costs, and linger­ing glob­al uncer­tain­ties have tempered vis­it­or numbers. 

Still, the island remains hope­ful, and is work­ing to build a tour­ism mod­el that is sus­tain­able, loc­ally bene­fi­cial, and true to St Helena’s unique identity.

Trend­ing in St Helena’s favour is the increas­ing num­ber of trav­el­lers who are seek­ing out unique, less-trav­elled des­tin­a­tions. Those who make the jour­ney to St Helena under­stand that while it is not the easi­est place to reach, it is well worth the trip. 

Through­out its his­tory, St Helena has often found itself at the mercy of forces bey­ond its con­trol. Its extreme isol­a­tion, once a stra­tegic asset, now presents steep logist­ic­al and eco­nom­ic chal­lenges. For a small island with lim­ited resources, the open­ing of a long-awaited, highly-anti­cip­ated air­port just before a glob­al shut­down can feel like a cruel twist of fate. 

Yet, des­pite the set­backs, there is a deep resi­li­ence here. The people of St Helena con­tin­ue to work toward a future on their own terms, where tour­ism grows thought­fully, oppor­tun­it­ies are cre­ated for the next gen­er­a­tion, and the island’s remark­able char­ac­ter is both pre­served and proudly shared with the world.

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What do you think? 

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About the author

Mar­cella Mit­tens wrote this art­icle based on her dis­ser­ta­tion and at the invit­a­tion of Tourism’s Hori­zon: Travel for the Mil­lions, a “GT” Insight Partner.

Ms Mit­tens lives on her home island of St Helena where she works with­in the St Helena gov­ern­ment’s eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment port­fo­lio. After earn­ing her degree at Can­ter­bury Christ Church Uni­ver­sity in Eng­land in 2024, Mar­cella chose to return to the Brit­ish Over­seas Ter­rit­ory to con­trib­ute to shap­ing a tour­ism future for her people: cre­at­ing career oppor­tun­it­ies for young Saint Hel­eni­ans (‘Saints’ as they are inform­ally known), open­ing mar­kets for St Helena’s dis­tinct­ive products, and invit­ing the world to exper­i­ence and appre­ci­ate the extraordin­ary place she proudly calls home.

Featured image (top of post)

Com­mer­cial flights from St Helena Air­port (HLE), the island’s first and only air­port, com­menced late 2017. Photo by Craig Wil­li­ams, sup­plied by St Helena Tourism.

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