Did you ever wonder what MCO stands for??

[crzy4dsny]

I was just sitting here wondering what MCO stands for. The name of the airport is Orlando International Airport. So where does MCO come from??

Just in case you were wondering too I looked it up and here is what I found. The world is at your fingers with the internet

"The current Orlando International Airport stands on the land that used to be McCoy Air Force Base (MCO)"

 

[disneyldwjr]

Yep, I knew that. They also have a B52 at one of the entrances, in a parklike setting.

 

[DebbieB]

On the Orlando TV stations, they are now referring to it as OIA (Orlando International Airport). I was talking to a coworker in the Orlando office recently and she referred to it as OIA ("my husband works near OIA"). It's still on the reservation sites as MCO but I wouldn't be surprised if that changes soon.

 

[pugdog]

I just wonder how many bags will get lost if they change it??

 

[gw_lit]

There was quite a lengthy series of posts about this a couple months ago.

Every airport has a 3 letter IATA (International Air Transport Association) code assigned to it. Generally speaking, the IATA code of an airport is very rarely changed. This code can, and typically will, differ from the acronym used in local jargon. Also, some aiport codes will make little sense since certain first letters are reserved for other uses (K (radio), N (navy), W (radio). Some examples:

Orlando: MCO (IATA); OIA (called locally) - MCO from McCoy AFB
Kansas City: MCI (IATA); KCI (called locally) - MCI from Mid-Continent International Airport (as it was originally called before it became KCI)
Nashville: BNA (IATA); Nashville International (called locally)
Louisville: SDF (IATA); LIA (called locally) - SDF from Standiford Field
Chicago (O'Hare): ORD (IATA) - ORD from Orchard Field
Denver: DEN (IATA); DIA (called locally)
Newark: EWR (IATA); Newark Liberty International (called locally)
Wichita: ICT (IATA); Wichita Mid-Continent Airport (called locally)

An excellent, and more complete, article on all of this can be found here .

 

[AllyBri]

I was just sitting here wondering what MCO stands for. The name of the airport is Orlando International Airport. So where does MCO come from??


Mickey Created Orlando

 

[crzy4dsny]

I was just sitting here wondering what MCO stands for. The name of the airport is Orlando International Airport. So where does MCO come from??


Mickey Created Orlando

Now why didn't I think of that

 

[CarolA]

BNA (Nashville) stands for Berry Nashville Field.
TYS (Knoxville) McGee Tyson Airport.

 

[PlaneJoy1]

The name of the airfield was McCoy Field in a past life. Thus, MCO.

 

[WillCAD]

In Baltimore we have Baltimore-Washington International. Locally we call it BWI, but the official IATA designation is BWI. Confusing, I know, but somehow we manage.

Then again, until the early 70s or so BWI was called Friendship International Airport, so how the IATA designation became BWI I'll never know...

 

[NotUrsula]

New Orleans' name story is one of the weirdest of all. It's MSY, which stands for Moisant Stock Yards. It's named after John Moisant, a stunt flier who crashed a biplane on the site in 1910 while trying to set a world speed record. At the time, it was pastureland that was part of Harahan Plantation. A stockyards was built there a few years later, and they named it Moisant Stock Yards, supposedly in his honor, but more because everyone would know where to find it b/c everyone in the area knew where Moisant had been killed.

When the airport was built, it was officially called Moisant Field; the locals called it Moisant. Everyone still called it that as late as the mid-1970's. The state of Louisiana went on a big tourism kick in the early 70's, and insisted that it be called New Orleans Int'l. (They had officially changed the name in the early 60's.) Just about the time everybody got used to that, they decided to rename it Louis Armstrong Intl. Airport. Older locals still call it Moisant, everyone else just calls it the New Orleans airport. Too many name changes.

 

[Poohlovr]

Louisville: SDF (IATA); LIA (called locally) - SDF from Standiford Field

In all of my many,many, long years living here (Born here--never left), I have never heard Standiford (SDF) called "LIA".

A couple of years ago, after massive renovation and expansion of the terminal building, the airport board renamed the facility "Louisville International Airport" (trust me, this is just delusional on their part, as the only international flights are UPS (no international passenger flights) but nobody ever refers to it as LIA and wemake fun of the "international" part. Just trying to be something they aren't. Kind of like if you called a pear an apple, would it still be a pear???


I, however, am LMAO.

 

[gw_lit]

I have a friend that moved to Louisville recently, and he calls it Louisville International... he's not a local, so maybe that's why he refers to it that way.

I'm from St. Louis originally and even though the airport is officially Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, all of the locals call it Lambert Field.