Yucca Airstrip is a private-use

airport An airport is an aerodrome with extended facilities, mostly for commercial air transport. Airports usually consists of a landing area, which comprises an aerially accessible open space including at least one operationally active surfa ...

located 17 miles (27 km) north of the central business district of Mercury, in

Nye County Nye County is a county in the U.S. state of Nevada. As of the 2020 census, the population was 51,591. Its county seat is Tonopah. At , Nye is Nevada's largest county by area and the third-largest county in the contiguous United States, behi ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...

, United States. The airport is located on the

Nevada Test Site The Nevada National Security Site (N2S2 or NNSS), known as the Nevada Test Site (NTS) until 2010, is a United States Department of Energy (DOE) reservation located in southeastern Nye County, Nevada, about 65 miles (105 km) northwest of the ...

and is owned by the

United States Department of Energy The United States Department of Energy (DOE) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government that oversees U.S. national energy policy and manages the research and development of nuclear power and nuclear weapons in the United Stat ...

. On the

sectional chart {{short description, Type of aeronautical chart In United States aviation, a sectional chart, often called a sectional for short, is a type of aeronautical chart designed for air navigation under visual flight rules (VFR). In Australia, Canada an ...

it is depicted as an unverified airstrip.

History

The airport was the staging area for Shot Badger, a test of the Upshot–Knothole Series of nuclear test shots on April 18, 1953.

Facilities

Yucca Airstrip Airport covers an area of and has two

runway According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a runway is a "defined rectangular area on a land aerodrome prepared for the landing and takeoff of aircraft". Runways may be a man-made surface (often asphalt, concre ...

s, one located on the salt flat and a shorter, more recently constructed asphalt runway just east of the salt flat: * Runway 01/19: 4,990 x 75 ft (1,521 x 23 m), surface:

asphalt Asphalt, also known as bitumen (, ), is a sticky, black, highly viscous liquid or semi-solid form of petroleum. It may be found in natural deposits or may be a refined product, and is classed as a pitch. Before the 20th century, the term ...

* Runway 14/32: 9,000 x 200 ft (2,743 x 61 m), surface:

salt Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quant ...

The asphalt runway was constructed in 2002 as part of an

unmanned aerial vehicle An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew, or passengers on board. UAVs are a component of an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which includes adding a ground-based controll ...

test facility.

References

*
Great Circle Mapper: UCC/KUCC - Mercury, Nevada (Yucca Airstrip)

External links

Airports in Nevada Buildings and structures in Nye County, Nevada Nevada Test Site Transportation in Nye County, Nevada Secret places in the United States {{Nevada-airport-stub