The attackers launched bombs and rockets at both the runway and the anti-aircraft defenses protecting it, but missed their targets.

[6] On 25 March 2012, the facility was officially renamed in memory of the late Colonel Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, the former President of Somalia, who was born in Galkayo.

[7] On 7 April 2014 a Briton and a Frenchman working for the United Nations were shot dead by a man in a police uniform while they sat in their car at Galkayo airport.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the U.N. Security Council both strongly condemned the attack and called on Somali authorities to bring the perpetrators to justice.

[9] On 2 October 2017 the airport's chief of security, Colonel Abdisalan Sanyare Owke, and his bodyguard, were shot dead by a policeman.