Ho Airport · IATA HZO · ICAO DGAH · Volta Region · Checked October 2026
Ho Airport: a US$25 million airport with no flights
It has the longest runway of any regional airport in Ghana, a control tower, a terminal built for 150,000
passengers a year and a car park waiting for cars. What it does not have is airlines. Ho Airport, outside the
Volta Regional capital, was finished years before the first plane carrying passengers arrived, lost its only
airline after less than four months, and in October 2026 has no scheduled flights at all. This is the honest
story, and how you actually get to Ho.
Ho Airport in brief
Key facts
Codes: IATA HZO, ICAO DGAH.
Location: at Titrinu, on the edge of Ho, capital of the Volta Region.
Owner and operator: Ghana Airports Company Limited (GACL).
Cost: about US$25 million, financed by a loan.
Runway: 1,900 m of asphalt, the longest of Ghana's regional airports.
Terminal: designed for 150,000 passengers a year.
Site: about 1,500 acres.
Sod cut: 18 September 2015. Completed: 2017–2018.
Passengers: 0 in 2019, 0 in 2020, 350 in 2021, 969 in 2022, according to Ghana Civil Aviation Authority figures.
Scheduled flights in October 2026: none.
Can you fly to Ho today?
No. No airline sells scheduled flights to Ho in October 2026. The last regular service, by Passion
Air, stopped on 25 March 2022. Since then the airport has seen occasional charter, private and training flights,
and special flights for events such as the national Independence Day celebrations held in Ho in March 2023,
but nothing you can book as an ordinary passenger.
If a flight is announced
Over the years many start dates have been promised for Ho. If you see a new one, check that tickets are
actually on sale on flypassionair.com or
flyafricaworld.com before you plan around
it. We will update this page as soon as real flights return.
On 18 September 2015 President John Dramani Mahama cut the sod for Ho Airport. It was part of a plan to give
every region its own airport, and he promised it would open up the Volta Region, attract investors and boost
agriculture, trade and tourism.
The warnings
Not everyone was convinced. The journalist Elizabeth Ohene, herself from Ho, wrote that she feared a
"no-flight airport", and compared it with the ghost airport of Castellón in Spain, which cost over 80 million
euros and for years never saw a flight. Even Togbe Afede XIV, Agbogbomefia of Asogli and co-chairman of Africa
World Airlines, said at the ceremony that the airport would become a white elephant without regular
patronage. He is reported to have advised that part of the money would be better spent on the road to Ho.
2017–2021: finished, but empty
The airport was completed around 2017–2018, then stood idle. In 2019 and 2020 it handled no passengers at all.
In April 2021 Africa World Airlines flew a test flight to a festive welcome and promised commercial flights within
weeks, at an introductory fare of GH¢99. They never started; the airline later said it had decided not to fly to
Ho because of operational challenges.
December 2021 – March 2022: Passion Air tries
Passion Air flew the first commercial passengers to Ho on 1 December 2021, with scheduled flights from
4 December on Fridays and Sundays, from GH¢150 one way. Ho is only about 20 to 30 minutes from Accra by air,
against three hours or more by road. But the planes flew far from full. In its first month the airport handled
350 passengers. On 25 March 2022 Passion Air suspended the route, citing low numbers, rising fuel prices, the
falling cedi, and a requirement from GACL that the airline build an office at the airport.
2023 onwards: a "ghost town"
In March 2023 the Electricity Company of Ghana cut the airport's power over unpaid bills of about GH¢63,000; it
was reconnected after payment. The press began to call Ho Airport a ghost town. Its loan still had to be repaid,
with almost no income to repay it from.
Who is to blame?
The answer depends on whom you ask, and Ho Airport has become a political football.
The critics, including officials of the later NPP government, say US$25 million was spent on an airport for which there was no market, and that the money should have gone to roads.
The defenders, including a former GACL managing director, say the airport was meant to turn Ho into an airport city that would attract investors, and that it was then left idle because Ghana had no national airline to use it.
The airlines say the numbers simply do not work: Ho is close enough to Accra that most people drive, and fuel and currency costs made a two-flights-a-week route a loss.
Our view
An airport alone does not create passengers. Without good roads, hotels, tour operators, marketing and
connections onwards from Accra, a 25-minute flight cannot compete with a three-hour drive. Ho is not the only
example: Ghana's history of national airlines tells the same story.
The new plan: an aviation hub instead of passengers
On 17 July 2026, during his Resetting Ghana tour in the Volta Region, President Mahama promised that Ho Airport
would not remain a white elephant. The plan is to use it for what does not need many passengers: a pilot training
school, an aeronautical engineering training centre, aircraft maintenance and repair, and aircraft valeting.
The Tema Development Corporation has started work on the Oxygen City housing project next to the airport, and
the Transport Minister said in July 2026 that the Ho Airport project was on course.
The idea is not new. Togbe Afede has pursued an aviation academy at Ho for years, and was reported to have paid
more than US$30,000 to GACL towards it, with the school promised for the end of 2025. It has not opened yet.
Our view
Training and maintenance could give the airport a real purpose. Until a school actually opens and an airline
actually sells tickets, treat every announcement with caution.
How to get to Ho, really
By road from Accra: about three to four hours, through Tema and across the Volta at the Adomi Bridge near Akosombo. Buses and shared minibuses run from Accra all day.
By car with a driver: the best way if you want to combine Ho with Akosombo, Wli Falls, Amedzofe or Mount Afadja.
From Kumasi or Tamale: by road, a long day; or fly to Accra and drive east.
From Togo: Ho is close to the border. Lomé is about three hours away by road through Aflao.
The weather in Ho at this moment, the time in Ghana, and a converter between cedis and the main currencies.
The Volta Region: what you came for
Whatever happens to its airport, the Volta Region is one of Ghana's most beautiful: mountains, waterfalls,
monkey sanctuaries, kente weaving villages, the lake behind the Akosombo Dam, and the lagoons and forts of the
coast at Keta. Ho, its capital, sits at the foot of the hills.
Tours in the Volta Region and parts of the Eastern Region: waterfalls, mountains, monkey sanctuaries and Lake
Volta. Entrance fees are included in the tour price; tips are not included but always welcome.
GhanaFlights.info belongs to an independent network of more than 70 travel, heritage and information websites,
which began with ghana-net.com in December 2000. No Google advertising, no sponsored praise, no picture-postcard
copy: just the routes and the places, as they are.
Updated and fact-checked: 28 October 2026. Passenger figures from the Ghana Civil Aviation
Authority; history from Ghana Airports Company, airline statements and Ghanaian press reports, 2015–2026. We will
update this page as soon as scheduled flights return to Ho. Text and research by Remo Kurka for GhanaFlights.info.
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