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Airport History

Vero Beach Airport was dedicated in 1930 and commercial airline service began in 1932 when Eastern Air Lines began using the airfield for refueling stops. In 1935, Eastern instituted passenger and mail service from Vero Beach.

During the World War II, the U.S. Navy selected Vero Beach Airport as the site for a naval air station and purchased an additional 1,500 acres surrounding Vero Beach Airport. The base was formally commissioned as Naval Air Station Vero Beach in November 1942 and pilot training began at NAS Vero Beach in February 1943. At the peak of its activity, NAS Vero Beach was home to 1,400 U.S. Navy and U.S. Marine Corps servicemen and 250 aircrafts. The aircraft types used at NAS Vero Beach:  SB2A Buccaneer, F4F Wildcat, F6F Hellcat and F7F Tigercat

After the war ended, NAS Vero Beach was reduced to a skeletal staff, and in 1947 the Navy closed NAS Vero Beach and returned the airport to the City of Vero Beach.

In 1948, major league baseball came to Vero Beach as Bud Holman, a local businessman, invited the Brooklyn Dodgers to take over former barracks facilities from the closed naval air station as a winter and spring training facility. The Dodgers liked the area so much that Dodgertown was born, a 109 acre tract adjacent to the airport, as their winter and spring training grounds. The Dodgers continued to use the facility even after they moved to California and became the Los Angeles Dodgers. This facility remained in operation until 2008, when the Dodgers moved to a new spring training facility in Glendale, Arizona.

In 1957, Piper Aircraft selected Vero Beach for their research and development center, which was also built on part of the grounds of the former naval air station. In 1961, Piper moved its administrative and manufacturing operations to Vero Beach Airport. Piper will continue to produce the aircrafts from their Vero Beach plant.

In 1966, FlightSafety Academy, a leading flight training school and an integral part of FlightSafety International, is established at Vero Beach Airport. The facility's primary focus is on ab initio flight training for prospective U.S. and international commercial airline pilots who are not graduates of a military flight training program.

Today, Vero Beach Airport is a 1,707 acre tower-controlled facility with a full Federal Aviation Regulation Part 139 operating certificate. Although the airport has had commercial airline service, primarily regional airline service, in the recent past, it currently has no scheduled commercial airline service.