Revetment (aircraft)

A revetment, in military aviation, is a parking area for one or more aircraft that is surrounded by blast walls on three sides. These walls are as much about protecting neighbouring aircraft as it is to protect the aircraft within the revetment; if a combat aircraft fully loaded with fuel and munitions was to somehow ignite, by accident or design, then this risks starting a chain reaction as the destruction of an individual aircraft could easily set ablaze its neighbours. The blast walls around a revetment are designed to channel any blast and damage upwards and outwards, away from neighbouring aircraft.

Blast pen

A blast pen was a specially constructed E-shaped double bay at British RAF World War 2 fighter stations, being either or wide and front-to-back, accommodating aircraft for safe-keeping against bomb blasts and shrapnel during regular enemy air-attacks.

Although the pens were open to the sky, the projecting sidewalls preserved the aircraft from all lateral damage, with thick, high concrete centres, and banked-up earth on either side, forming a roughly triangular section wide at their base. The longer spine section behind the parking areas usually encloses a narrow corridor for aircrew and servicing personnel to employ as an air raid shelter.

Existing examples may still be seen at the present Kenley Aerodrome and at North Weald Airfield, although some pens have had their second bay removed over the years, thus becoming U-shaped rather than E-shaped. There are also a large number at the former RAF Catterick, and some at RAF Wittering. The Imperial War Museum Duxford has one that is accessible to the public. While common on Fighter Command airfields, other RAF Stations such as RAF Benson and RAF Brize Norton did not have any blast pens.

Gallery

File:Royal Air Force- Operations in Malta, Gibraltar and the Mediterranean, 1940-1945. CM3241.jpg, Soldiers construct aircraft revetments at RAF Ta Kali, Malta, using locally quarried limestone blocks, c. 1942
File:Royal Air Force- Operations in Malta, Gibraltar and the Mediterranean, 1940-1945. CM3237.jpg, Refuelling and rearming a Spitfire Mark VC(T), in a revetment constructed from empty fuel tins filled with sand at RAF Ta Kali, Malta in 1942
File:F4F-4 VMF-122 at Camp Kearney 1942.jpeg, A US Marine Corps Grumman F4F-4 Wildcat in a concrete revetment in 1942 at Camp Kearny, California
File:Jackson Airfield - New Guinea.jpg, B-17 Flying Fortress bombers parked in revetments at Jackson Airfield, New Guinea, in 1943
File:Destroyed C-130 Hercules in revetment Vietnam.JPG, A destroyed US Air Force Lockheed C-130 Hercules in Vietnam, c. 1967
File:F-4D 924th TFW AFRES at Kunsan AB 1985.JPEG, A McDonnell Douglas F-4D Phantom II aircraft parked in a revetment made from profiled steel panels at Kunsan Air Base, South Korea
File:BELIZE 90 23.jpg, A British Aerospace Harrier GR3 in a revetment at Belize International Airport in 1990
File:EGWC - Sepecat Jaguar T4 - Royal Air Force - XX835 EX (42044399884).jpg, SEPECAT Jaguar T4 in a revetment built from gabions at RAF Cosford in 2018

See also

* Revetment (a sloped wall)
* Hardened aircraft shelter

Bibliography

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Military airbases
Fortifications by type

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