Map - Bacolod-Silay International Airport (Bacolod Silay International Airport)

Bacolod–Silay Airport, also referred to as Bacolod–Silay International Airport (Hulugpaan sang Bacolod–Silay; Paliparan ng Bacolod–Silay; ), is the main airport serving the general area of Metro Bacolod, in the Western Visayas region of the Philippines.

The airport is located 15 km northeast of Bacolod on a 181 ha site in Barangay Bagtic, Silay, Negros Occidental. The facility inherited its IATA and ICAO airport codes from Bacolod City Domestic Airport, which it replaced in 2008. Capable of handling international air traffic, the airport is the busier of the two major airports serving Negros Island, the other being Dumaguete Airport in Sibulan, Negros Oriental.

Despite being billed as an international airport, Bacolod–Silay is designated as a class 1 principal domestic airport by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, a body of the Department of Transportation that is responsible for the operations of not only this airport but also of all other public airports in the Philippines except the major international airports.

The site of Bacolod–Silay Airport was one of the main airfields for the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service (IJAAS) bombers and fighters in Negros. It was captured by American forces in 1944 and 1945. After the war, parts of the airfield became a sugarcane plantation.

Planning for a new airport for Bacolod commenced in 1997, when the Japan International Cooperation Agency initiated a study indicating the need for expansion at four Philippine airports: namely Bacolod City Domestic Airport, Mandurriao Airport in Iloilo City, Legazpi Airport in Legazpi and Daniel Z. Romualdez Airport in Tacloban.

In February 1999, another JICA study was commissioned, this time on the detailed plan of the new airport. The study was completed by March 2000 and was funded by a 430 million-yen grant. Immediately after the completion of the study, JICA hired Pacific Consultants International as advisers to the project.

The project was opened for bidding on August 25, 2003, with the winning bid going to the Takenaka–Itochu Joint Venture (TIJV). Physical construction on the new 4.3 billion-peso airport, funded in part by an 8.2 billion yen loan, commenced in August 2004. A 900-day deadline was imposed for the airport to be completed, which broadly corresponded to January 2007. During construction, remains of the Japanese airfield and some war aircraft wrecks were dug.

On July 13, 2007, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo attended the facility's inauguration. The airport was considered complete by July 16, but there was "considerable debate" over whether the airport should be opened for regular commercial traffic due to the 500 m runway extension, necessary for accommodating larger aircraft, not having been built by that time.

The first aircraft ever to land at the airport was a small fourteen-seater turboprop owned by Vincent Aviation. The Reims-Cessna F406 with aircraft registration number ZK-VAF, piloted by Steve Gray of New Zealand landed at the airport on September 26, 2007, at 9:55 a.m.

The airport commenced regular commercial operations and was officially opened on January 18, 2008. The first commercial flight to arrive was Cebu Pacific's Flight 5J 473 from Manila, an Airbus A319-100 piloted by Silay native Captain Allan Garces which landed at 5:22 a.m. PST on the day of opening. The first international flight to arrive at the airport was a chartered plane from Almaty, Kazakhstan which landed at 10:58 a.m. on January 2, 2009 carrying eight passengers and eight crew members.