St. George airport to close for months for runway rehab

ST. GEORGE, Utah — A southern Utah airport serving more than 200,000 commercial passengers a year will close for four months to let crews rip up and rebuild a runway undermined by unstable blue clay.

St. George Regional Airport manager Rich Stehmeier tells The Spectrum the closure is scheduled May 29 to Sept. 26.

Stehmeier calls the $25.8 million reconstruction project the “Big Fix.”

It’ll be mostly paid for with Federal Aviation Administration and federal infrastructure funds.

Plans call for digging 17 feet beneath the more than 1-mile long runway and installing more stable material.

St. George is about 120 miles from Las Vegas and 275 miles from Salt Lake City.

The airport handles Delta, United and American flights to Phoenix, Denver, Los Angeles and Salt Lake City.