Alfonso Bonilla Aragón International Airport , formerly known as Palmaseca International Airport, is an international airport located between Palmira and Cali, the capital of Valle del Cauca Department, Colombia. It is Colombia's fourth-busiest airport in passenger volume, with 5,600,000 people using the airport in 2016, and third largest in area and construction. The airport often serves as the alternate airport for Bogotá - El Dorado Int'l Airport and other Colombian airports. The airport lies in the center of the wide and fertile Cauca River valley, which runs north - south between the Western and Central Colombian Andes ranges. It is approximately a five-hour flight from Santiago de Chile, 50 minutes from Quito, Ecuador, and about three hours, 18 minutes from Miami. The airport is one of the very few secondary airports in Latin America that operates 24 hours a day. This is made possible by the year-round stable meteorological conditions, and its distance from both Cali and Palmira, which means it is not subject to any noise restrictions, allowing aircraft to take off and land at any time of day. The airport has non-stop flights to the United States, Spain, Ecuador, Panama and Peru. History On April 21, 1921 Ferruccio Guicciardi flew his Italian-made Macchi-Hanriot HD-1, (named "Telegraph I") from Guayaquil, Ecuador, to Cali, with stops in Quito and Pasto, Colombia. This was the first aircraft ever to land in Cali. He claimed the $9,500 peso prize offered by the Department of Valle and the Cali City Council to the first pilot who landed in the city. This event marked the birth of aviation activity in the capital of Valle del Cauca. SCADTA Following the war with Peru in 1932, President Enrique Olaya Herrera sought the help of SCADTA engineers and pilots to find a suitable site for an airport capable of providing air support to military operations. After evaluating several alternatives, the German pilot Herbert Boy chose an area called "El Guabito" because of its location, proximity to the city and an extension of Juanchito Antioquia Avenue. After leveling the land with bulldozers a fledgling Air Force Base and Air National Guard station were built and operations began on September 21, 1933. Eventually, the number of airlines operating from the airport grew to include TACA de Colombia and VIARCO SAETA along with the already established SCADTA Panagra. However, Panagra began looking for a suitable place for an airport in