A ‘turning of dirt’ ceremony has taken place at Alabama’s Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport (Birmingham), marking a start to the construction of a $27 million air cargo facility.

The new building will have 48,500 sq ft of warehouse space, 17 bays in the load docks and five airside bay doors, and will be the home-base for a new line of business that includes weekly, scheduled international cargo flights from Stuttgart, Germany.

Darlene Wilson, chair of the Birmingham Airport Authority, said: “This has been a long-term goal of the airport and to see it all coming together is a huge win for our community.

“We have the infrastructure in place. We have the best partners in the business. And we have the determination to continue building on what we established earlier this year.”

In February 2023, the airport joined with global logistics leader, Kuehne+Nagel in a partnership that aims to bring regularly scheduled, international cargo flights into Birmingham.

Over time, the partnership is said to transform Birmingham into a long-term gateway to and from the Southeastern Corridor of the US.

Currently, Kuehne+Nagel is operating out of a temporary hangar but will move into the new air cargo facility once it’s completed in spring 2024.