51st fighter interceptor wing at suwon, s

Suwon Air Base is a Republic of Korea Air Force (ROKAF) base near

Suwon Suwon (, ) is the capital and largest city of Gyeonggi-do, South Korea's most populous province which surrounds Seoul, the national capital. Suwon lies about south of Seoul. It is traditionally known as "The City of Filial Piety". With a populati ...

city.

Units

The base is home to the ROKAF's 10th Fighter Wing (제10전투비행단), comprising: *101st Fighter Squadron flying KF-5E/KF-5F/F-5F *153rd Fighter Squadron flying

F-4E The McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II is an American Tandem#Aviation, tandem two-seat, twinjet, twin-engine, all-weather, long-range supersonic aircraft, supersonic jet interceptor aircraft, interceptor and fighter-bomber originally developed ...

*201st Fighter Squadron flying KF-5E/KF-5F/F-5F The US ARMY 6th Battalion,

52nd Air Defense Artillery Regiment The 52nd Air Defense Artillery Regiment is an air defense artillery regiment of the United States Army first organized in 1917 as a railway gun unit. It continued in that role unit 1943, when the regiment was broken in separate railway gun batta ...

operating

Patriot missiles The MIM-104 Patriot is a surface-to-air missile (SAM) system, the primary of its kind used by the United States Army and several allied states. It is manufactured by the U.S. defense contractor Raytheon and derives its name from the radar compon ...

is stationed at the base.

History

Korean War

The base was originally established during the Korean War as Suwon (K-13) Air Base and hosted United States Air Force units. The base was evacuated on the night of 30 June 1950 in the face of the Korean People's Army (KPA) attack, but the base was not occupied by the KPA until 2 July 1950. The base was recaptured on 24 September 1950 following the

Inchon landings The Battle of Incheon (), also spelled Battle of Inchon, was an amphibious invasion and a battle of the Korean War that resulted in a decisive victory and strategic reversal in favor of the United Nations Command (UN). The operation involved s ...

. The 811th Engineer Aviation Battalion arrived at the base on 1 October to repair the airfield and laid down PSP over the runway. The base was evacuated in the face of the Chinese Third Phase Campaign on 5 January 1951 and the base's buildings were destroyed. The base was recaptured on 28 January as part of Operation Thunderbolt and by 6 March, despite its poor condition, the base was used for the staging of

F-86 The North American F-86 Sabre, sometimes called the Sabrejet, is a transonic jet fighter aircraft. Produced by North American Aviation, the Sabre is best known as the United States' first swept-wing fighter that could counter the swept-wing Sov ...

patrols along the Yalu River and Mig Alley. USAF units based at Suwon included: *

4th Fighter Wing The 4th Fighter Wing is a United States Air Force unit assigned to the Air Combat Command's Ninth Air Force. It is stationed at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, where it is also the host unit. The wing is one of two Air Force uni ...

from 30 March-23 August 1951 * 8th Fighter Wing from 23 August 1951 – 20 October 1954 *

51st Fighter Wing The 51st Fighter Wing (51 FW) is a wing of the United States Air Force and the host unit at Osan Air Base, South Korea. The wing has been based entirely in the Far East during its entire existence, including its combat role as the ''51st Fighter ...

from 1 October 1951 – 26 July 1954 *

12th Fighter Squadron 012 may refer to: * Tyrrell 012, a Formula One racing car * The dialing code for Pretoria, South Africa See also * 12 (disambiguation) Twelve or 12 may refer to: * 12 (number) * December, the twelfth and final month of the year Years * 12 BC * ...

operating P-51s in 1950 *

16th Fighter Squadron HV-016 is a former military unit of Norway, that was a part of the Home Guard. It was established after 1985 to "stop terror- or sabotage actions that could weaken or paralyze Norway's ability to mobilize its military and its ability to resist". ...

operating F-86Ds from 20 May 1951-July 1954 *

25th Fighter Squadron The 25th Fighter Squadron is part of the US Air Force's 51st Operations Group, 51st Fighter Wing, at Osan Air Base, South Korea. It operates the Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II aircraft conducting close air support missions. Mission ...

operating F-86Ds from 1951 to 1954 *

35th Fighter Squadron The 35th Fighter Squadron is a United States Air Force unit, assigned to the 8th Operations Group, stationed at Kunsan Air Base, South Korea. The squadron operates the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft conducting air superiority mi ...

operating P-51s in 1950 and operating F-80s from 1951 to 1952 and operating F-86F Sabrejets from 1953 to 1954 *

36th Fighter Squadron The 36th Fighter Squadron is part of the US Air Force's 51st Operations Group at Osan Air Base, South Korea. It operates the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft conducting air superiority missions. The squadron was first activated ...

operating P-51s in 1950 and operating F-80s from 1951 to 1954 * 39th Fighter Squadron operating F-86Ds from 1952 to 1954 * 67th Fighter Squadron operating P-51s in December 1950 * 68th Fighter Squadron operating F-94s from March-19 April 1951, 23–27 June 1951 and 24 August 1951 – 23 March 1952 * 80th Fighter Squadron operating F-80s and later F-86s from 24 August 1951 – 21 October 1954 * 319th Fighter Interceptor Squadron operating F-94Bs from 10 March 1952 – 17 August 1954 * 334th Fighter Squadron operating F-86s from 10 March-1 May 1951 * 335th Fighter Squadron operating F-86s from 1 May-1 August 1951 *

336th Fighter Squadron The 336th Fighter Squadron (336th FS), nicknamed ''the Rocketeers'', is a United States Air Force unit. It is assigned to the 4th Operations Group and stationed at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina. The 336th was constituted on 2 ...

operating F-86s from 6 April-27 June 1951 On 17 June 1951, at 01:10 hours, Suwon was bombed by two Korean People's Air Force Polikarpov Po-2s. Each biplane dropped a pair of fragmentation bombs. Two bombs burst on the flight line of the 335th Fighter Squadron. One F-86A, AF Ser. No. 49-1334 was struck on the wing and began burning; the fire took hold, gutting the aircraft. Eight other Sabres were also damaged in the attack. On 22 December 1952, a Hellenic Air Force C-47D, Ser. No. 49-2612 was taxiing at Suwon Air Base when it was hit by USAF F-80, AF Ser. No. 49-0722, that was taking off, killing all 13 on board the C-47.

Postwar

USAF units based at Suwon included: *

operating A-10s from 1981 to 1989 * 82nd Fighter Squadron operating F-102s from 30 January-20 February 1968 as part of Operation Combat Fox and on rotation from 1968 to 1971 *

operating F-4s from 25 March – 17 April 1977

Accidents and incidents

On 10 October 1984, a corporately-owned Northrop F-20 Tigershark, AF Ser. No. ''82-0062'', c/n GG1001, FAA registration ''N4416T'', on a world sales tour, crashed at Suwon, killing Northrop chief test pilot

Darrell Cornell Darrell Eugene Cornell (August 19, 1932 - October 10, 1984) was Northrop's chief test pilot in the early 1980s. He was killed on October 10, 1984, at Suwon Air Base, while performing a demonstration flight for the South Korean Air Force (ROKAF). T ...

. During the last manoeuvre of the final demonstration flight, the aircraft stalled at the top of an erratic vertical climb and dove into the ground from .Peterson, Wayne, "''Tigershark!: The Freedom Fighter's Last Hurrah''", Wings, Woodland Hills, California, June 2006, Volume 36, Number 6, page 52. On 23 May 1996, Korean People's Air Force Captain Lee Chul-Su defected in Shenyang J-6 #529, landing at Suwon. On 5 May 2006 Captain Kim Do-hyun of the ROKAF's

Black Eagles Black Eagles ( es, Águilas Negras) is a term describing a series of Colombian drug trafficking, right-wing, counter-revolutionary, paramilitary organizations made up of new and preexisting paramilitary forces, who emerged from the failures ...

display team was killed when he lost control of his

A-37B Dragonfly The Cessna A-37 Dragonfly, or Super Tweet, is an American light attack aircraft developed from the T-37 Tweet basic trainer in the 1960s and 1970s by Cessna of Wichita, Kansas. The A-37 was introduced during the Vietnam War and remained in pea ...

during an air show. On 11 January 2022, Major Shim Jeong min from ROKAF's 10th Fighter Wing was killed due to engine fire in his KF-5E during training. He stayed in jet to avoid crashing into nearby village.

References

External links

{{authority control South Korean airbases Korean War air bases Buildings and structures in Suwon Transport in Suwon