Jomsom Airportजोमसोम विमानस्थल

Jomsom belongs to the generation of airfields that made mountain Nepal reachable. From the 1960s–70s, RNAC and the Civil Aviation Department — with Swiss and UN help at places like Jomsom — built dozens of short mountain strips: a few hundred metres of grass or gravel on a shelf above a valley, served by aircraft that climb like the terrain demands. The flag carrier flew Pilatus Porter STOL aircraft from 1961 and Twin Otters from 1971, and it literally built dirt runways as it expanded, seeding the network that still serves the high districts.

At its peak Nepal had over 50 registered airfields, and the STOL strips were many districts' only access to the outside world. That network is now being hollowed out from below: CAAN's airport profile today lists 56 airports, of which 34 are in operation and 18 are not — the non-operational list being mostly the very strips made redundant by the new roads they preceded. Jomsom remains on the operating side of that ledger, serving the Mustang valley where the pattern of Nepali transport history is at its clearest: aviation led, roads followed.

For trekkers, strips like Jomsom and Lukla are still the practical doorways into the high country — see Amarnepal's trekking-routes section for the trails they serve.