Soa Airport logged 593 aircraft under “Pesawat” in 2025

Labuan Bajo — Soa Airport in Ngada Regency, central Flores, recorded 593 under the “Pesawat” (aircraft) category for 2025, alongside 26,399 passengers and 8,584 units of cargo, according to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation’s online airport profile.

The figures provide a basic picture of activity at the domestic airport serving the Soa and Bajawa area. However, the profile lists the headline traffic metric only as “Pesawat” and does not specify whether the number refers to aircraft movements, scheduled flights, arrivals, departures or another operational category.

What the official profile shows

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation identifies Soa Airport by the ICAO code WATB and the IATA code BJW, and places it in Masumeli village, Soa District, Ngada Regency, East Nusa Tenggara. The airport is described as a domestic public facility operated by a technical unit under the Directorate General of Civil Aviation.

In the profile, Soa is classified as a Class III airport, with an aerodrome reference code of 3C and a critical aircraft type of ATR 72-600 as the design reference for the runway and airside facilities. Academic analyses of Soa’s runway design similarly use the ATR 72-600 as the planning aircraft and confirm that, under Indonesian aviation regulations, this turboprop falls into the 3C code group.

The Hubud page lists two routes linked to the airport but does not name destinations, operating airlines or flight frequencies in its publicly visible text. Separate technical studies of Soa’s operations describe domestic services using ATR 72-600 aircraft and mention Wings Air and TransNusa flying Kupang–Bajawa and Kupang–Bajawa–Labuan Bajo sectors, but these documents do not specify which routes were active throughout 2025.

The traffic data currently available on the official profile for 2025 are:

• Aircraft (Pesawat): 593
• Passengers (Penumpang): 26,399
• Cargo (Kargo): 8,584 (unit not specified)
• Routes (Rute): 2

These figures indicate regular domestic aviation activity at Soa Airport but, on their own, they do not show whether traffic is growing, how intensively the airport’s facilities are used, or what share of Flores air travel the airport carries.

How to interpret the 2025 figures

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation publishes national statistics for air transport, including annual data on aircraft movements, passengers, cargo and baggage. These tables distinguish between aircraft movements and other metrics at the aggregate level, but the airport-specific profile for Soa does not explain the methodology behind its “Pesawat” figure.

Without a clear definition, the 593 total cannot safely be presented as 593 flights, 593 movements or 593 individual aircraft handled. A movement count typically refers to a takeoff or a landing, while flight totals or aircraft counts may be compiled differently in operational reporting.

The passenger number of 26,399 for 2025 is similarly reported as a single annual total. The publicly accessible profile does not split this figure between arrivals and departures, nor does it identify the proportion of transit passengers or distinguish between resident and tourist travel. The cargo total of 8,584 is listed without a unit, so it is not clear from the profile whether it represents kilograms, tonnes, consignments or another measure.

For policymakers, tourism operators and investors assessing access to central Flores, more detailed data would be needed to use Soa’s 2025 statistics as an indicator of connectivity or demand. Time-series figures across several years, together with route-level schedules and inbound versus outbound passenger counts, would be required to establish whether Soa Airport is expanding as an alternative gateway or maintaining a limited domestic role.

Context for central Flores access

Soa Airport’s location near Bajawa makes it relevant to plans for distributing tourism beyond the established gateway of Labuan Bajo. Technical studies that use ATR 72-600 aircraft as the design reference for Soa’s runway underline its positioning for regional turboprop services rather than larger jet operations.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation’s airport profile currently offers a 2025 snapshot of Soa’s traffic and technical classification, but not a historical timeline or route-level breakdown. Until such data are available, the confirmed figures for aircraft, passengers and cargo at Soa can be used as a baseline reference point, not as evidence for trends or shifts in tourism flows across Flores.

Sources

• Hubud Kemenhub – Bandar Udara Soa profile
• Analisis Perencanaan Perkerasan Runway Dengan Metode FAA (Soa Airport study)
• Kapasitas Sisi Darat Soa Airport study (journal PDF)