Bundesarchiv Bild 146-1972-093-59, Pillau, Einschiffung von Flüchtlingen

Baltiysk (also Noytif) was a military

air base An air base (sometimes referred to as a military air base, military airfield, military airport, air station, naval air station, air force station, or air force base) is an aerodrome used as a military base by a military force for the operation ...

Baltiysk Baltiysk (russian: Балти́йск; german: Pillau; Old Prussian: ''Pillawa''; pl, Piława; lt, Piliava; Yiddish: פּילאַווע, ''Pilave'') is a seaport town and the administrative center of Baltiysky District in Kaliningrad Oblast, Ru ...

Kaliningrad Oblast Kaliningrad Oblast (russian: Калинингра́дская о́бласть, translit=Kaliningradskaya oblast') is the westernmost federal subject of Russia. It is a semi-exclave situated on the Baltic Sea. The largest city and administr ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. It is located on the

Vistula Spit The Vistula Spit ( pl, Mierzeja Wiślana; russian: Балтийская коса; german: Frische Nehrung) is an aeolian sand spit, or peninsular stretch of land that separates Vistula Lagoon from Gdańsk Bay, in the Baltic Sea, with its tip sepa ...

, southwest of Baltiysk center within the

city proper A city proper is the geographical area contained within city limits. The term ''proper'' is not exclusive to cities; it can describe the geographical area within the boundaries of any given locality. The United Nations defines the term as "the si ...

, on the opposite side of the

Strait of Baltiysk The Strait of Baltiysk (russian: Балтийский пролив, pl, Cieśnina Piławska, german: Pillauer Tief) is a strait enabling passage from the Baltic Sea into the brackish Vistula Lagoon, located in Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia. The con ...

close to the westernmost point of Russia. Originally constructed in the 1930s by

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

for the ''

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...

'', it was unused during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

but was damaged by

Allied An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

bombings. In 1945 after the war ended, the air base came into possession of the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

and entered limited service with the

Soviet Air Force The Soviet Air Forces ( rus, Военно-воздушные силы, r=Voyenno-vozdushnyye sily, VVS; literally "Military Air Forces") were one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces. The Air Forces ...

, who used the remains of the air base to house a small number of

interceptor Interceptor may refer to: Vehicles * Interceptor aircraft (or simply "interceptor"), a type of point defense fighter aircraft designed specifically to intercept and destroy enemy aircraft * Ford Crown Victoria Police Interceptor, a police car * ...

alert pads. The base was home to the 509th Independent Aviation Squadron Helicopters between 1955 and 1958 and the 49th Independent Anti-Submarine Aviation Squadron between 1948 and 1995. In 1957 Western intelligence identified 25

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 (russian: Микоя́н и Гуре́вич МиГ-15; USAF/DoD designation: Type 14; NATO reporting name: Fagot) is a jet fighter aircraft developed by Mikoyan-Gurevich for the Soviet Union. The MiG-15 was one of ...

(ASCC: Fagot) jet fighters based at Baltiysk.AIRFIELD ACTIVITY IN THE USSR AND SATELLITES (BASED ON(Sanitized)PHOTOGRAPHY), October 1957, CREST: CIA-RDP78T04753A000300040010-6, Central Intelligence Agency, Washington, DC. By the early 1960s, Baltiysk had become a reserve airfield, and intelligence missions no longer observed any aircraft the airfield. The Baltiysk/Noytif Seaplane Base () operated in the harbor on the northeast side of the airfield until the 1970s. It had five hangars adjoining the waters. The

Beriev Be-6 The Beriev Be-6 (USAF/DoD reporting name "Type 34", NATO reporting name "Madge") was a flying boat produced by the Soviet Union, Soviet Beriev Aircraft Company, Beriev OKB. It was capable of accomplishing a wide variety of missions, such as long- ...

(Madge) was one type of seaplane observed at this base.OAK SUPPLEMENT PART 7 KH-9 MISSION 1204 11 OCTOBER - 17 DECEMBER 1972, January 1973, CREST: CIA-RDP78T04752A000100010004-2, Central Intelligence Agency, Washington, DC., p. 125. The Baltiysk airfield complex was deactivated in the 1990s following the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...

, and has since been abandoned.

References

External links

RussianAirFields.com
Soviet Air Force bases Soviet Naval Aviation bases Soviet Air Defence Force bases {{Russia-mil-stub