There are airports that exist primarily to move people efficiently, and then there are airports that feel like the holiday has already started the moment you turn base. Heraklion International Airport “Nikos Kazantzakis,” ICAO code LGIR, sits on the northern coast of Crete and serves as Greece’s second-busiest airport after Athens. In 2024 alone, it handled over 9.3 million passengers, the vast majority of them Europeans chasing the Aegean summer.
It’s a workhorse airport with a genuinely spectacular setting, and now Lisium Design has brought it to MSFS 2024.
The developer describes LGIR as having been built with particular attention to what makes the real airport visually distinctive. That starts with the geography: the runway threshold sits metres from the sea, the urban sprawl of Heraklion fills the approach corridor, and the Cretan highlands rise sharply to the south. Lisium Design says all of this has been recreated using custom, accurate terraforming.
Beyond the terrain, the feature list covers what you’d expect from a modern payware release: a faithful terminal and apron layout, detailed custom ground textures, custom lighting, carefully modelled interiors, custom ground clutter, and historical buildings and landmarks in and around the airport.
The airport traces its origins back to the early post-war era, growing from a modest military airfield into what it is today. A new facility at Kastelli is currently under construction and scheduled to replace the current airport at some point in the next few years, which makes this scenery something of a period piece as much as a current-day representation. In the simulator world, that’s actually a feature: LGIR’s compact, characterful terminal, the close-in urban environment, and that coastal runway threshold aren’t going to be around forever in real life.
For those flying European charter or low-cost routes in the sim, LGIR is a high-priority destination. It’s a natural stop on any Mediterranean route network, and the approach over the Aegean is one of the more memorable ones in the region.
LGIR Heraklion by Lisium Design is available now on Contrail, priced at €17.99 + tax.
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