USAF To Buy Shannon Airport?

national | miscellaneous | news report Monday April 07, 2003 13:39 by JYZ

Business Briefs - 03 April 2003 - THE United States Air Force has expressed an interest in purchasing Shannon airport.

An international commercial bank is also believed to be interested in acquiring one third of Aer Rianta, and selling Shannon on to the USAF. The deal would value the State-owned airport operator at $2.6 to $3 billion. The overture by the unnamed bank was brought to the attention of Transport Minister Seamus Brennan at Aer Rianta's board meeting last October. With the removal of the compulsory stopover for trans-atlantic routes, Shannon's facilities would be of most interest to international freight forwarders or delivery companies, as well as the USAF.
'Obviously we would be interested,' Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral Craig Quigley told the Washington Post yesterday. 'Shannon is an excellent facility with a top-class runway. It would be very suitable as a strategic and secure troop transport facility.'
Although Aer Rianta's plans are at an early stage, it is conservatively reckoned that Shannon would command a pricetag of around $1.8 billion. The prospect of a windfall will be welcomed by Aer Rianta staff if they can secure a 5% stake in the company, similar to the stakes negotiated by employees in other state-owned companies.
If a third of the business were then sold for 850 million euros, the 3,300 employees could look forward to the tidy sum of nearly 13,000 euros each.