The current terminal opened in 1988, was also designed by Halfdan Grieg and cost NOK 250 million. This was followed up with a new control tower which opened in 1991. It had a limited height because of restrictions caused by the military designation of the main parallel taxiway as an emergency runway. By the mid-1980s there were 35 to 40 daily offshore helicopter flights out of Flesland each day. This was causing a press on the runway's capacity as the helicopters had to cross the runway to reach the North Sea. As estimates showed up to 60 flights per day, the airport started working on plans for a separate helicopter terminal, which would have been located southwest of the old main terminal and would have its own helicopter runway. Instead the traffic flatted out and the old main terminal was converted to a helicopter terminal. Braathens Helikopter established a base with two helicopters at Flesland in 1990. Within two years it had secured a thirty-percent market share of the offshore traffic. However, the airline was taken over by Helikopter Service in 1993.