# Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD)

> Dulles, US · IATA: IAD · ICAO: KIAD · Large Airport · Cargo Hub

## Quick Facts

| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| IATA | `IAD` |
| ICAO | `KIAD` |
| City | Dulles |
| Country | US |
| Type | Large Airport |
| Elevation | 95 m |
| Cargo | ✅ |
| GPS | 38.94450, -77.45580 |

## Description

For all its size as a transatlantic passenger gateway, Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD/KIAD) remains a comparatively modest freight station: 202,334 tons of cargo moved through it in 2025, down from roughly 247,000 tons the year before. Almost all of that travels as belly cargo, with United Airlines' Dulles hub and United Cargo feeding the bulk of the volume, while dedicated freighter operations remain limited. Swissport runs a modern cargo warehouse on the field and Air General handles carriers including IAG Cargo, Aer Lingus, Royal Air Maroc, Copa and Cathay Cargo, across a cargo area of six warehouse buildings with truck docks and dedicated aircraft stands. U.S. Customs and Border Protection clears imports on site, with FDA and USDA involvement for food, pharmaceuticals and agricultural goods. The airport lies about 42 kilometres west of central Washington in Loudoun County, Virginia, connected by the Dulles Access Road and interstates 66 and 495, with trucking links reaching Baltimore, Philadelphia and metropolitan New York. Shippers needing more freighter capacity typically use Baltimore/Washington (BWI, around 90 kilometres) or New York JFK and Newark (EWR, roughly 380 kilometres). Virginia's economic development agencies have set out to grow Dulles into a larger East Coast cargo gateway, and terminal and handling upgrades are planned to support that.

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*Freight Academy — Airport Profile: [https://www.freight-academy.com/en/information/airports/washington-dulles-international-airport-iad](https://www.freight-academy.com/en/information/airports/washington-dulles-international-airport-iad)*

*Markdown mirror: [https://www.freight-academy.com/api/md/airports/en/washington-dulles-international-airport-iad](https://www.freight-academy.com/api/md/airports/en/washington-dulles-international-airport-iad)*

*LLM-Summary (JSON): https://www.freight-academy.com/api/v1/airports/washington-dulles-international-airport-iad/llm-summary*