Naval Air Station Brunswick is United States Navy airfield in Brunswick, Maine—the only one in New England.

Operations

NAS Brunswick is home to five active duty and two reserve squadrons. Flying Lockheed P-3 Orion long-range maritime patrol aircraft tasked by Patrol and Reconnaissance Wing Five, active duty squadrons regularly deploy overseas for six months at a time. NAS Brunswick has 29 tenant commands, including a Reserve P-3 squadron and a Reserve Fleet Logistics Support Squadron flying Lockheed C-130 Hercules transports. In addition, over 1,600 Naval Reservists travel from throughout New England to drill at Naval Air Reserve Brunswick, Seabee Battalion and numerous other reserve commands.

Approximately 20 percent of NAS Brunswick's activities, facilities and services are in direct support of the AEGIS Destroyer shipbuilding program at nearby Bath Iron Works. Also, the Navy's only cold weather Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE ) school is taught at Brunswick and on 12,000 acres (49 km²) near Rangeley in northwestern Maine.

History

The U. S. Naval Air Station, Brunswick, Maine was first commissioned on April 15, 1943, with the primary mission of training Royal Canadian Air Force pilots for the British Naval Command. The station, encompassing 1,487 acres (6 km²), was built on a plot of land which had been willed to the needy people of Brunswick for the sole purpose of picking blueberries.

The air station was deactivated in October 1946, after which the land and buildings were leased jointly to the University of Maine and Bowdoin College. On March 15, 1951, the dormant base was recommissioned a Naval Air Facility with the established mission of supporting three patrol squadrons and one Fleet Aircraft Service Squadron, and a planned future mission as a Master Jet Base . Such a base required dual 8,000 foot (2.4 km) runways and two outlying fields, one for gunnery and one for carrier practice landings.

External links

• NAS Brunswick website
• globalsecurity.org: NAS Brunswick