Suvarnabhumi was officially opened for limited domestic flight service on 15 September 2006, and opened for most domestic and all international commercial flights on 28 September 2006. The airport is located on what had formerly been known as Nong Nguhao in Racha Thewa in Bang Phli, Samut Prakan province, as well as the districts of Bang Kapi, Lat Krabang, Bang Na, and Prawet in the eastern side of Bangkok, about 25 kilometres (16 mi) from downtown. The terminal building was designed by Helmut Jahn of Murphy/Jahn Architects. It was constructed primarily by ITO JV. The airport had the world's tallest free-standing control tower (132.2 metres or 434 feet) from 2006 to 2014. Suvarnabhumi was reassigned the IATA airport code, BKK, from Don Mueang after that airport ceased international commercial flights. Motorway 7 connects the airport, Bangkok, and the heavily industrial eastern seaboard of Thailand, where most export manufacturing takes place. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the airport was temporarily converted to a hospital and vaccination center. "The Japanese government would end up assisting the new airport project as ODA, and in 1996, the project took a step forward with the signing of a loan agreement between the Government of Thailand and the Japanese government. Then, in 1996, Second Bangkok International Airport Company Ltd. (SBIA) was established as the project implementation organization, and the project got underway." It was scheduled to finish by 2000. The airport was due to open in late 2004. Still, a series of budget overruns, construction flaws, and allegations of corruption plagued the project. A further delay was caused by the discovery that the airport had been built over an old graveyard. Superstitious construction workers claimed to have seen ghosts there. On 23 September 2005, the Thai airport authority held a ceremony where 99 Buddhist monks chanted to appease the spirits. Full tests of the airport took place on 3 and 29 July 2006. Six local airlines—Thai Airways International, Nok Air, Thai AirAsia, Bangkok Airways, PBair, and One-Two-Go Airlines—used the airport as a base for twenty domestic flights. Suvarnabhumi officially opened at 03:00 on 28 September 2006, taking over all flights from Don Mueang. The first flight to arrive was a Lufthansa Cargo flight LH8442 from Mumbai at 03:05. The first Asian commercial arrival was Japan Airlines at 03:30. The next arrival was Aerosvit flight VV171 from Kyiv at 04:30, and the first cargo departure was Saudi Arabian Airlines flight SV-984 to Riyadh at 05:00. Aerosvit also had the first passenger departure (VV172 to Kyiv) around 05:30. Difficulties were reported in the first few days of the airport's operation. On the first day alone, sluggish luggage handling was common—the first passenger arrival by Aerosvit took an hour for the luggage to start coming out, and some flights did not have their luggage coming out even after four hours. Flights were delayed (Thai Airways claimed that 17 of 19 flights were delayed that day), and there were failures with the check-in system. Subsequent problems included the failure of the cargo computer system, and the departure boards displaying the wrong information, resulting in confused passengers (unlike Don Mueang, there were no "final calls" issued). Months after its opening, issues of congestion, construction quality, signage, provision of facilities, and soil subsidence continued to plague the project, prompting calls to reopen Don Mueang to allow for repairs to be made. Expert opinions varied widely on the extent of Suvarnabhumi's problems as well as their root cause. Most airlines stated that damage to the airport was minimal. Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont reopened Don Mueang for domestic flights voluntarily on 16 February 2007, with 71 weekly flights moved back initially, but no international flights. In January 2007, ruts were discovered in the runways at Suvarnabhumi.