Ben Guerir Air Base is a

Royal Moroccan Air Force The Royal Moroccan Air Force ( ar, القوات الجوية الملكية; ber, Adwas ujenna ageldan; french: Forces Royales Air) is the air force of the Moroccan Armed Forces. History The Moroccan air force was formed on 14 May 1956 as the ...

base in the Marraksh-Safi region, located about north of

Marrakech Marrakesh or Marrakech ( or ; ar, مراكش, murrākuš, ; ber, ⵎⵕⵕⴰⴽⵛ, translit=mṛṛakc}) is the fourth largest city in the Kingdom of Morocco. It is one of the four Imperial cities of Morocco and is the capital of the Marrakes ...

, near the town of

Ben Guerir Ben Guerir ( ar, بن ڭرير, ber, ⴱⴻⵏ ⴳⵔⵉⵔ, Ben Grir) is a university town and military town that serves as the capital of Rehamna Province in central Morocco, in the Marrakesh-Safi region. it hosts Mohammed VI Polytechnic Univer ...

. It previously served as a

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

base and

Transatlantic Abort Landing Space Shuttle abort modes were procedures by which the nominal launch of the NASA Space Shuttle could be terminated. A pad abort occurred after ignition of the shuttle's Space Shuttle Main Engine, main engines but prior to liftoff. An abort during ...

(TAL) site for the

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program na ...

History

Ben Guerir was established in 1951 by the U.S.

Strategic Air Command Strategic Air Command (SAC) was both a United States Department of Defense Specified Command and a United States Air Force (USAF) Major Command responsible for command and control of the strategic bomber and intercontinental ballistic missile ...

(SAC) as one of five bases constructed in what was then

French North Africa French North Africa (french: Afrique du Nord française, sometimes abbreviated to ANF) is the term often applied to the territories controlled by France in the North African Maghreb during the colonial era, namely Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. In ...

for SAC during a "crash program" which began in 1950. The base was located to allow for the rapid deployment of nuclear-armed

Boeing B-47 Stratojet The Boeing B-47 Stratojet (Boeing company designation Model 450) is a retired American long-range, six-engined, turbojet-powered strategic bomber designed to fly at high subsonic speed and at high altitude to avoid enemy interceptor aircraft ...

s, without requiring

aerial refueling Aerial refueling, also referred to as air refueling, in-flight refueling (IFR), air-to-air refueling (AAR), and tanking, is the process of transferring aviation fuel from one aircraft (the tanker) to another (the receiver) while both aircraft a ...

, although

Boeing KC-97 Stratofreighter The Boeing KC-97 Stratofreighter is a four-engined, piston-powered United States strategic tanker aircraft based on the Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter. It replaced the KB-29 and was succeeded by the Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker. Design and developm ...

s were also deployed from the base. In 1956, the entire RB-47E force operated by the 91st Strategic Reconnaissance Wing's 322nd, 323rd and

324th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious or cultural significance in many societie ...

s spent 90 days at Ben Guerir on

temporary duty assignment Temporary duty travel (TDY), also known as temporary additional duty (TAD), is a designation reflecting a United States Armed Forces service member's—or civilian Department of Defense employee's—travel or other assignment at a location other t ...

. SAC occupied the base until 1963; the base operating unit was the 3926th Air Base (Later "Combat Support") Group, assigned to the

5th Air Division The 5th Air Division (5th AD) is an inactive United States Air Force unit. Its last assignment was with Strategic Air Command, based at Sidi Slimane Air Base, Morocco. It was inactivated on 15 July 1958. The unit's origins begin with its predec ...

and later to the

4310th Air Division The 4310th Air Division is a discontinued United States Air Force organization. It was last assigned to the Sixteenth Air Force at Nouasseur Air Base, Morocco. It was discontinued on 15 August 1963. History The 4310th Air Division was organize ...

. The base was designated as a Transoceanic Abort Landing (TAL) site for the Space Shuttle in July 1988, replacing the former TAL site at

Casablanca Casablanca, also known in Arabic as Dar al-Bayda ( ar, الدَّار الْبَيْضَاء, al-Dār al-Bayḍāʾ, ; ber, ⴹⴹⴰⵕⵍⴱⵉⴹⴰ, ḍḍaṛlbiḍa, : "White House") is the largest city in Morocco and the country's econom ...

. The site was chosen largely for its location near the nominal

ground track A ground track or ground trace is the path on the surface of a planet directly below an aircraft's or satellite's trajectory. In the case of satellites, it is also known as a suborbital track, and is the vertical projection of the satellite's or ...

of the shuttle orbiter for a mid-range

inclination Orbital inclination measures the tilt of an object's orbit around a celestial body. It is expressed as the angle between a Plane of reference, reference plane and the orbital plane or Axis of rotation, axis of direction of the orbiting object ...

launch, meaning a diversion to the TAL site would require minimal use of fuel. Ben Guerir last served as a TAL site in June 2002, for

STS-111 STS-111 was a space shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS) flown by Space Shuttle ''Endeavour''. STS-111 resupplied the station and replaced the Expedition 4 crew with the Expedition 5 crew. It was launched on 5 June 2002, fro ...

, which landed at

Edwards Air Force Base Edwards Air Force Base (AFB) is a United States Air Force installation in California. Most of the base sits in Kern County, but its eastern end is in San Bernardino County and a southern arm is in Los Angeles County. The hub of the base is E ...

at the conclusion of its flight. The base was deactivated in 2005, after supporting 83 shuttle missions. The base is home to an Escadre de Chasse (Fighter Wing), with three squadrons of General Dynamics F-16C/D Fighting Falcons: the "Falcon", "Spark", and "Viper" squadrons.

Facilities

Ben Guerir has one runway which is oriented in a North-South direction, is wide, with shoulders, and is long, with a underrun and a compacted dirt overrun, for a total length of . During renovations made by

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

in 1988, the runway was equipped with shuttle-unique landing aids, including a

microwave landing system The microwave landing system (MLS) is an all-weather, precision radio guidance system intended to be installed at large airports to assist aircraft in landing, including 'blind landings'. MLS enables an approaching aircraft to determine when it ...

and

Tactical Air Navigation A tactical air navigation system, commonly referred to by the acronym TACAN, is a navigation system used by military aircraft. It provides the user with bearing and distance (slant-range or hypotenuse) to a ground or ship-borne station. It is a mor ...

(TACAN) system. The Moroccan Air Force is currently upgrading Ben Guerir Air Base to support its acquisition of F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft.

References

External links

Ben Guerir Air Base at Airliners.net

* ttp://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/spacecraft/q0278.shtml Space Shuttle Abort Modes* 3973d Combat Defense Squadron's Webpage for the SAC's 16th Air Force Units and Bases,
Ben Guerir Air Base
{{Strategic Air Command Air force installations of Morocco Installations of the United States Air Force in Morocco Installations of Strategic Air Command Space Shuttle Emergency Landing Sites

History

Facilities

See also

References

Further reading

External links