Birmingham Airport’s new runway extension becomes operational on Thursday and will be ready to take fully laden, long haul A380 jets. The 400m extension increases the runway length to 3,003m. China Southern will be the first long-haul airline to take advantage of the extended runway from July 22 when it operates a charter flight to and from Beijing. Runway extension construction began in autumn 2012 and cost £33M. Contractor was a Colas VolkerFitzpatrick joint venture. Designer was Halcrow (CH2MHill), project manager Turner & Townsend and airport engineering advisor URS.