Honiara International Airport — Honiara, Solomon Islands

Better known by its wartime name of Henderson Field, HIR occupies ground that saw some of the fiercest fighting of the Pacific campaign, after Japanese forces built the original airstrip in 1942 only for American Marines to capture and hold it during the brutal Guadalcanal campaign that followed. The airfield's name honors Lofton Henderson, a Marine aviator killed earlier in the Battle of Midway, and decades later the site still draws military history enthusiasts alongside ordinary travelers passing through Honiara, the Solomon Islands' capital. Rusting wartime relics remain scattered across parts of Guadalcanal, a quiet reminder of the island's outsized historical significance relative to its small modern population. Today the airport handles modest passenger volumes connecting the Solomon Islands to Australia, Fiji, and other Pacific destinations, reflecting the isolated geography and limited economic scale of this South Pacific archipelago nation.