Hunter Army Airfield

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
"Hunter Field" redirects here. For the baseball park in Texas, see
Hunter Field (Abilene)
.

Hunter Army Airfield

AMSL
42 ft / 12 m
Coordinates32°00′36″N 081°08′44″W / 32.01000°N 81.14556°W / 32.01000; -81.14556
Websitehome.army.mil/stewart
Map
KSVN is located in Georgia
KSVN
KSVN
Location of Hunter Army Airfield
Runways
Direction Length Surface
ft m
10/28 11,375 3,467 Asphalt

Hunter Army Airfield (IATA: SVN, ICAO: KSVN, FAA LID: SVN), located in Savannah, Georgia, United States, is a military airfield and subordinate installation to Fort Stewart located in Hinesville, Georgia.

Hunter features a runway that is 11,375 feet (3,468 m) long and an

aircraft parking area that is more than 350 acres (1.4 km2). The runway and apron, combined with the 72,000 sq ft (6,689 m2) Arrival/Departure Airfield Control Group (A/DACG) Facility and nearby railhead, allow the 3rd Infantry Division from nearby Fort Stewart to efficiently deploy soldiers and cargo worldwide. NASA identified Hunter as an alternate landing site for the Space Shuttle orbiters.[3]

Tenants

Currently, Hunter Army Airfield has approximately 5,500 soldiers, airmen, coast guardsmen and Marines on station. It is home of the aviation units of the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) headquartered at Fort Stewart. There are also a number of non-divisional units assigned to Hunter as well.

Coast Guard Air Station Savannah

MH-65 Dolphin
helicopters, Air Station Savannah provides the Savannah area, Coastal Georgia and South Carolina with round-the-clock search and rescue coverage of the area, to include both inland waters and off shore areas. They also provide security to the shores and borders with specialized Coast Guard sniper units.

History

Origins

In 1929, the General Aviation Committee of the Savannah City Council recommended that the 730 acre (3 km2) Belmont Tract, belonging to J. C. Lewis, be accepted by the Council as the future site of the Savannah Municipal Airport. The cost of the land was $35,000. By September 1929, the runway and several buildings were ready and the city officially opened the new facility, known as Savannah Municipal Airport.

The airport became a part of Eastern Air Transport Incorporated air route on 2 December 1931, when Ida Hoynes, daughter of the Mayor, Thomas M. Hoynes, broke a bottle of Savannah River water on a propeller blade of an 18-passenger Curtiss Condor II during the christening ceremony.

Frank O. Hunter

The airport was named Hunter Municipal Airfield during Savannah Aviation Week in May 1940, in honor of

Lieutenant Colonel (Lt. Col.) Frank O'Driscoll Hunter, a native of Savannah and a World War I flying ace.[6]
Lt. Col. Hunter was not scheduled to appear in Savannah that week; However, he paid a surprise visit to the field on the first day of Aviation Week while en route to France to serve as a United States Military Air Attaché.

Savannah Army Air Base

On 30 August 1940, the United States Army Air Corps received approval to build a base at Hunter Municipal Airfield. Official dedication of the airfield as Savannah Army Air Base took place 19 February 1941. The Army Air Corps assigned Savannah AAB initially to the Southeast Air District (later Third Air Force), III Air Support Command.[7]

The

A-20 Havocs, remanned and retrained at Hunter. It was then deployed for combat with Twelfth Air Force
in North Africa in July 1942.

During early 1942 after the

Pearl Harbor Attack, Savannah AAB became a base for several Antisubmarine groups and squadrons of I Bomber Command and later Army Air Forces Antisubmarine Command with a mission to patrol the Atlantic coast, locate and attack German U-boats
.

Throughout 1942, light bomber and dive bomber groups received combat training at Savannah AAB before being deployed to the combat zones overseas. These groups included the:

With the U-boat mission taken over by the Navy after mid-1943, Savannah AAB became a training base for Martin B-26 Marauder medium bomber crews. Marauder groups which received final combat training were:

At the end of the war, Savannah AAB was used as a Separation Center for the discharge and furlough of service members returning from Europe. In June 1946, the airfield was returned to the City of Savannah.

From 1946 to 1949, many of its buildings were leased to industrial plants. Some of the buildings were used as apartment houses, and an orphanage was located in the former commanding officer's quarters. The University of Georgia established an extension campus on part of the old base, as well.

United States Air Force

On 1 March 1949,

B-50 Superfortress. The limited facilities at Chatham made the base unfit for permanent use. Plans were made to close the base and move the B-50s to more suitable facilities. Rather than see the Air Force move elsewhere, Savannah offered to exchange airfields with the federal government
along with 3,500 acres (14 km2) of additional land around Hunter for future base expansions. This arrangement was agreed upon and on 29 September 1950, the 2d Bomb Group moved to the base, reopened as Hunter Air Force Base and Chatham was turned over to the City of Savannah. At the time, Hunter AFB became the only U.S. military installation named for a living American, Major General (Retired) Frank Hunter.

Strategic Air Command

Hunter AFB was assigned to the Strategic Air Command's (SAC) Second Air Force. Two major SAC medium bombardment wings were assigned to Hunter during the 1950s. Both came under the 38th Air Division which was also headquartered at Hunter.

  • 2nd Bombardment Wing
    , 22 September 1950 – 1 April 1963
The 2d Bomb Wing was the host unit at Hunter from the time the base reopened in 1950 until SAC left in 1963. It was initially equipped with
B-52s
and remains to this day.
The 308th Bomb Wing was a second B-47 Wing assigned to Hunter. The 308th deployed primarily to SAC bases in
Little Rock AFB, Arkansas
in 1962.

On 11 March 1958, a B-47E which departed Hunter on a simulated combat mission accidentally dropped a Mark 6 fission bomb minus its nuclear component near Florence, South Carolina.[8] A home was destroyed and several people were injured.[9] The aircraft was taking part in Operation Snow Flurry at the time of the incident.[10]

Military Air Transport Service

The phaseout of SAC Medium Bomber (B-47 Wings) in the early 1960s resulted in SAC leaving Hunter in 1963. The base was reassigned to the

C-124 Globemaster II
intercontinental cargo aircraft to points around the world.

Air Defense Command

Beginning in 1955

Air Defense Command
designated Hunter AFB as part of a planned deployment of forty-four Phase I Mobile Radar stations. It was one of twenty-nine stations which were sited around the perimeter of the country to support the permanent ADC network of seventy-five stations. The ADC radar site at Hunter was given designation M-112.

On 1 March 1955 the 702d Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron began operating

AN/FPS-26
height-finder radar.

During late 1961 Hunter AFB joined the

AN/FPS-67
B in 1966, and the AN/MPS-14 was removed in 1968.

In addition to the main facility, Air Defense Command at Hunter operated three unmanned

AN/FPS-18
Gap Filler sites:

When Hunter AFB was transferred to the US Army in 1967 becoming Hunter Army Airfield, the radar site was renamed Savannah Air Force Station (AFS) . The 702nd Radar Squadron continued routine operations for many years, and, the equipment at the station was upgraded or modified to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the information gathered by the radars.

The station was deactivated on 5 June 1979.

United States Army Airfield

Japanese Air Force One at Hunter Army Airfield

In 1964, the Department of Defense announced that the base would be closed, along with 94 other military installations. The Air Force was given a period of three years to phase out operations.

In December 1966, at the height of the

Fort Rucker, Alabama
was operating at capacity and additional facilities were needed. Hunter Air Force Base was turned over to the Army and operated in conjunction with Fort Stewart, located 45 miles (72 km) southwest of Hunter.

Brigadier General Frank Meszar, Commanding General of Fort Stewart, formally accepted the base from Colonel James A. Evans Jr., Commander of Hunter AFB, in a formal change of command and service ceremony on 1 April 1967, at which point the facility was renamed Hunter Army Air Field (Hunter AAF). The headquarters of the Army Aviation School Element moved to Hunter from Fort Stewart, where it had been established during the summer of 1966. The element's mission was to coordinate the training of fixed-wing and rotary-wing aviators as an extension of the Army's training programs at Fort Rucker and Fort Wolters, Texas
.

On 28 July 1967, the combined facilities of Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield were re-designated the

Republic of Vietnam Air Force
students began Advanced helicopter training at Hunter on 13 March 1969. As the number of Vietnamese flight students increased, flight training for U.S. Army officers and warrant officers at Hunter was gradually phased out, ending on 16 June 1970.

In 1973, Hunter AAF was deactivated, but it was later reopened in 1975, serving as a support facility for the 24th Infantry Division (Mechanized), at Fort Stewart. The 24th Infantry Division, or Victory Division, became part of the nation's Rapid Deployment Force on 1 October 1980. The Victory Division's ability to deploy on short notice was enhanced by its large runway (the Army's longest runway east of the Mississippi River), Savannah's deep-water port facility and excellent rail and road networks.

Military jet and turboprop aircraft based at

Shaw AFB
in South Carolina also continue to make regular use of Hunter AAF's long runway for local training, to include practice approaches and landings.

See also

References

Public Domain This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency

  1. ^ "Change of Command at Hunter Army Airfield". WTOC Channel 11. 28 May 2009. Archived from the original on 4 May 2018.
  2. PDF
    , effective 10 April 2008
  3. ^ "Hunter Army Airfield / Coast Guard Air Station Savannah". Archived from the original on 2 April 2013. Retrieved 5 April 2013.
  4. ^ "Headquarters and Headquarters Company (HHC) Aviation Brigade 3rd Infantry Division". History.army.mil. Archived from the original on 15 April 2021. Retrieved 14 August 2012.
  5. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 7 August 2016. Retrieved 28 May 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. ISBN 0-915430-00-2
    .
  7. ^ Hunter Army Airfield History at Team Stewart.mil Archived 8 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ "Oxnard Press-Courier - Google News Archive Search". news.google.com. Retrieved 4 May 2018.
  9. ^ "Atomic Bomb dropped on Florence, S.C., March 11, 1958 - www.thecolumbiastar.com - Columbia Star". thecolumbiastar.com. Archived from the original on 31 August 2017. Retrieved 4 May 2018.
  10. ^ "Mars Bluff Bomb". Florence County Museum. Archived from the original on 26 October 2014. Retrieved 22 September 2014.

External links

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