(sorry if this is a duplicate - am having e-mail problems today) You're confusing the ICAO and the IATA codes. The ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization) assigns a letter to different regions of the world (C is Canada, K is USA (except Hawaii and Alaska, which are part of the P region), Europe is E, etc. In the USA (K only) and Canada, the ICAO code is the prefix plus the IATA 3 letter code; in the rest of the world, it is the prefix plus a country code and a 2 letter airprot identifier. Examples (city/ICAO/IATA): Montreal/CYUL/YUL Los Angeles/KLAX/LAX Chicago O'Hare/KORD/ORD Ottawa/CYOW/YOW Fairbanks/PAFA/FAI Honolulu/PHNL/HNL Kahului (Maui)/PHOG/OGG London (Heathrow)/EGGL/LHR David R > They don't all start with a "Y". My home field (Bromont, Quebec) is classified > as an "airport" (that is it is licensed as such by Transport Canada, as opposed > to an aerodrome, registered or not; this information can be found in the Canada > Flight Supplement), but its call letters are CZBM (in fact all Canadian airport > designators now start with C) > > In point of fact over time "Y" as the second letter in the designator has come > to mean an aiport where weather observations were made, either by a weather > observer or an automated station, and hence METARs and TAFs are available for > that station. > > YMMV, it could be that by now some "Y" fields no longer have Wx services. > > Mike Gammon > > > > > From: Matthew Montano <mmontano@xxxxxxxxx> > > Date: Mon, 18 Aug 2003 08:49:10 -0700 > > To: AIRLINE@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > > Subject: Re: Full power in YUL > > > > Actually airports start with an 'a'. > > > > Just kidding. > > > > Most Canadian airports had their three-character designation derived > > from their 2 digit rail code prefixed by a Y. > > > > Of course, time has passed and there are a few Canadian airports with > > the Y, and many using codes that have nothing to do with a rail > > station. (YYZ, YXX.).. > > > > And of course there are a few that have a city type code, but the > > airport is no where near the rail station. YEG - for Edmonton. > > > > Matthew > > > > On Monday, August 18, 2003, at 12:40 AM, Alireza Alivandivafa wrote: > > > > > Pretty cool. Did they send any to YMX? Oh, speaking of Canadian > > > aviation, > > > why do all the airports start with Y? > > > > >