Krabi is set to be one of Thailand's newest beach destinations with the opening of its airport, the start of direct air services to and from Bangkok and the TAT marketing initiative. Currently the resort has a total 5,000 hotel beds of which 3,000 are in the category of three stars and above. But this is insufficient to meet the expected tourism expansion therefore more hotels are under construction and have got be open by the start of the high season in November as they have already been contracted to tour operators.

Krabi's airport has a turbulent history. It first opened back in 1986 a joint venture between the town's private & public sectors. The air service was operated by an 18 setae aircraft and with such limited capacity was not successful. Clearly Crab needed a much larger airport and work on the new one by the Department of Aviation started in 1993. And was finally opened on 10 July 1999 by The Prime Minister, Mr. Chuan Leukepai.

The terminal building is grafted onto the side of a cliff with passengers arriving on the ground floor to re-claim their bags and then having to take an escalator to the first floor to leave the building. Apart from passenger and baggage handling the terminal building has limited services. The restaurant, to be managed by a yet to be announced local company is due to open in the next month. In the event of a delay of more than three hours passengers would be taken to a nearby hotel for a meal. There is no where yet open to buy a drink, a snack, a newspaper or a magazine. Although Thai Airways operate their flight with both business and economy class, there is no dedicated check-in for Royal Executive Class passengers, nor the exclusive lounge for them to wait in. It could be said that the airport opened before it was ready but the basics are there, flight land and take-of to schedule and the niceties can follow later.

Thai Airways International was the first airline to operate a commercial from Bangkok on 11th July. Their flight a Boeing 737-400 with 12-business class and 137 economy class will operate three times a week on Tuesday, Friday and Sunday. TG 249will depart Bangkok 10.15am arriving into Krabi at 11.35 am and TG250 will depart for Bangkok at 12.10 pm arriving at 13.30 pm.

PB Air operated their first commercial service on 14th July with PB86 departing Bangkok on a German Fairchild Dornier 328 at 1530 arriving into Krabi at 17.10 am with PB87 leaving for Bangkok at 17.40 pm arriving at 19.20 pm.

Now the sky is the limit for Krabi.