Aden International Airport — Aden, Yemen

Aden guards the entrance to the Red Sea at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, a strategic position that made it a British Crown Colony and major coaling and refueling station for over a century before Yemeni independence in 1967. The airport serving this historic port rises barely 7 feet above the water and makes do with one runway, a modest footprint for a city whose harbor once ranked among the world's busiest bunkering stops under British administration. Aden briefly served as capital of an independent South Yemen before unification with the north in 1990, and the city retains a distinct character shaped by that separate colonial and post-colonial history compared to Sana'a and the northern highlands. Decades of conflict in Yemen have affected air traffic through the region considerably, with operations at times reduced or suspended entirely depending on the security situation. The port's deep natural harbor, formed in the crater of an extinct volcano, remains one of the most striking geographic features of any major Arabian coastal city. For a country where overland travel can be difficult and unsafe, ADE remains an important, if often disrupted, air link to the outside world.