Cecil Airport is a public

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 ...

and commercial

spaceport A spaceport or cosmodrome is a site for launching or receiving spacecraft, by analogy to a seaport for ships or an airport for aircraft. The word ''spaceport'', and even more so ''cosmodrome'', has traditionally been used for sites capable ...

located in

Jacksonville, Florida Jacksonville is a city located on the Atlantic coast of northeast Florida, the most populous city proper in the state and is the List of United States cities by area, largest city by area in the contiguous United States as of 2020. It is the co ...

, United States. It is owned by the

Jacksonville Aviation Authority The Jacksonville Aviation Authority (JAA) is the independent government agency that owns and operates the four airports of Jacksonville, Florida, US. It was established in 2001 after being branched off of the Jacksonville Port Authority. History ...

and services military aircraft, corporate aircraft, general aviation, and air cargo. The

Florida Army National Guard The Florida Army National Guard is Florida's component of the United States Army and the United States National Guard. In the United States, the Army National Guard comprises approximately one half of the federal army's available combat forces ...

's primary Army Aviation Support Facility and the

U.S. Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, military, mul ...

Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron The Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON) is an armed United States Coast Guard helicopter squadron specializing in Airborne Use of Force (AUF) and drug-interdiction missions. It is based at Cecil Field in Jacksonville, Florida. HI ...

(HITRON) are also located here, the former operating

CH-47 Chinook The Boeing CH-47 Chinook is a tandem rotor helicopter developed by American rotorcraft company Vertol and manufactured by Boeing Vertol. The Chinook is a heavy-lift helicopter that is among the heaviest lifting Western helicopters. Its name, C ...

UH-60 Blackhawk The Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk is a four-blade, twin-engine, medium-lift utility military helicopter manufactured by Sikorsky Aircraft. Sikorsky submitted the S-70 design for the United States Army's Utility Tactical Transport Aircraft System ( ...

UH-72 Lakota The Eurocopter (now Airbus Helicopters) UH-72 Lakota is a twin-engine helicopter with a single, four-bladed main rotor. The UH-72 is a militarized version of the Eurocopter EC145, built by American Eurocopter (now Airbus Helicopters, Inc.), a ...

and C-12 Huron aircraft, and the latter operating the

MH-65C Dolphin The Eurocopter MH-65 Dolphin is a twin-engined helicopter operated by the United States Coast Guard (USCG) for medevac-capable search and rescue (SAR) and armed Airborne Use of Force missions. It is a variant of the French-built Eurocopter A ...

helicopter. The airport has

ARFF Aircraft rescue and firefighting (ARFF) is a type of firefighting that involves the emergency response, mitigation, evacuation, and rescue of passengers and crew of aircraft involved in aviation accidents and incidents. Airports with schedule ...

and structural fire protection provided by Jacksonville Fire/Rescue Station 56. Fire Station 73 (under construction) will be located on the airfield as well and will include ARFF, structural and rescue (ambulance) protection. A back-up, citywide 911 call/training center will also be located at Station 73. Cecil Airport, commonly known as either "Cecil" or "Cecil Commerce Center", also houses the FSCJ (Florida State College Jacksonville) aviation course hangar and associated training aircraft. Sunrise Aviation, a flight training school and pilot supplies vendor is the flight training provider for FSCJ's aviation program. Facilities operated by major aerospace firms such as Logistic Services International (LSI),

Boeing The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and p ...

and Flightstar Aircraft Services are also located at Cecil, providing major training, maintenance and overhaul services for a variety of U.S. military aircraft. In 2010, Cecil Airport became the United States' eighth licensed commercial

and the first in Florida authorized to fly space vehicles that take off and land horizontally. The ~~NZC~~ identifier was the airport's previous FAA identifier when it was

Naval Air Station Cecil Field Naval Air Station Cecil Field or NAS Cecil Field was a United States Navy air base, located in Duval County, Florida. Prior to October 1999, NAS Cecil Field was the largest military base in terms of acreage in the Jacksonville, Florida area. NA ...

, its former name until its closure as a naval air station in 1999. The NZC IATA code is now allocated to

Maria Reiche Neuman Airport The Maria Reiche Neuman Airport is a small airport serving Nazca, in the Ica Region of Peru. The airport is named after Maria Reiche, a principal researcher and proponent of the Nazca Lines. The airport receives a small number of domestic ch ...

serving Nazca, Peru .

History

The airport is located on the site of the former

, which opened in 1941 and closed in 1999 following the

1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission The 1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission preliminary list was released by the United States Department of Defense in 1993 as part of the Base Realignment and Closure Commission. It recommended closing 33 major United States military bases. ...

decision. Covering a total area of 22,939 acres (92.8 km²), it was the largest military base in the Jacksonville area and supported all Atlantic Fleet F/A-18 Hornet strike fighter squadrons and

S-3 Viking The Lockheed S-3 Viking is a four-crew, twin-engine turbofan-powered jet aircraft designed and produced by the American aerospace manufacturer Lockheed Corporation. Because of its characteristic sound, it was nicknamed the "War Hoover" after th ...

sea control squadrons.GlobalSecurity.org: NAS Cecil Field
/ref>

Facilities and aircraft

Cecil Airport covers an area of 6,082 acres (24.61 km²) and contains four

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: * Runway 18L/36R: 12,503 x 200 ft. (3,811 x 61 m), surface: asphalt/concrete * Runway 18R/36L: 8,002 x 200 ft. (2,439 x 61 m), surface: asphalt/concrete * Runway 9R/27L: 8,003 x 200 ft. (2,439 x 61 m), surface: asphalt/concrete * Runway 9L/27R: 4,439 x 200 ft. (1,353 x 61 m), surface: asphalt/concrete For the 12-month period ending February 5, 2018, the airport had 104,361 aircraft operations, an average of 286 per day: 52% military (53,899), 47% general aviation (49,372), <1% air carrier (744) and <1% air taxi (346). There were 92 aircraft based at this airport: 69 military, 17 single-engine, 2 multi-engine, 2 jet and 2 helicopter.

References

External links

Cecil Field
page at the Jacksonville Aviation Authority website * brochure fro
CFASPP

Cecil Spaceport
Cecil Spaceport in Jacksonville website
Jacksonville JetPort
FBO at Cecil Airport * * {{Authority control Airports in Jacksonville, Florida Spaceports in the United States Westside, Jacksonville