The Honduras Air Force ( es, Fuerza Aérea Hondureña, sometimes abbreviated to FAH in English) is the

air force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an ...

Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...

. As such it is the air power arm of the Honduras Armed Forces.

History

The first Honduras military flying took place on 18 April 1921 in a Bristol F.2b Fighter biplane flown by an American contracted pilot, while in 1923 the first government flying school was founded with the assistance of Italian investors.Hagedorn 1986, p. 57. The forerunner of the modern air force, the , or National Aviation School, came into being on 14 April 1931. In 1938 it was renamed the or Military Aviation School and Honduras Air Force, when its first combat aircraft were acquired. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

it fought against the Axis powers, between 1942 and 1944 performing anti-submarine patrols along its Caribbean coastline. After the war the HAF re-equipped with aircraft from

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

and

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; french: Aviation royale canadienne, ARC) is the air and space force of Canada. Its role is to "provide the Canadian Forces with relevant, responsive and effective airpower". The RCAF is one of three environm ...

stocks including five Lockheed P-38 Lightnings and five

Bell P-63 Kingcobra The Bell P-63 Kingcobra is an American fighter aircraft that was developed by Bell Aircraft during World War II. Based on the preceding Bell P-39 Airacobra, the P-63's design incorporated suggestions from P-39 pilots and was superior to its p ...

s which were its first high performance fighters. Honduras ratified the

Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance The Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (commonly known as the Rio Treaty, the Rio Pact, the Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, or by the Spanish-language acronym TIAR from ''Tratado Interamericano de Asistencia Recíproca'') is an agree ...

in 1947, and within the next 10 years the United States supplied new aircraft including 19

Vought F4U Corsair The Vought F4U Corsair is an American fighter aircraft which saw service primarily in World War II and the Korean War. Designed and initially manufactured by Chance Vought, the Corsair was soon in great demand; additional production contract ...

fighter bombers, several

Douglas C-47 Skytrain The Douglas C-47 Skytrain or Dakota ( RAF, RAAF, RCAF, RNZAF, and SAAF designation) is a military transport aircraft developed from the civilian Douglas DC-3 airliner. It was used extensively by the Allies during World War II and remained ...

transports, and six North American AT-6C armed- and six T-6G advanced trainers. In 1969 Honduras fought the one week long Football War with

El Salvador El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south ...

. The HAF managed to successfully bomb the Salvadorean fuel supplies at Acajutla and Cutuco and fight the enemy's air force out of the sky. Later it provided close air support to the Honduras Army. After the cease fire, both countries tried unsuccessfully to acquire their first jets to replace their old propeller-driven aircraft. The political climate eventually changed and by the mid-1970s the HAF re-equipped with 10 old ex-Yugoslav Canadair CL-13 Mk.4 Sabre, 16 ex-Israeli

Dassault Super Mystère B2 Dassault Group (; also GIM Dassault or Groupe Industriel Marcel Dassault SAS) is a French group of companies established in 1929 with the creation of Société des Avions Marcel Bloch (now Dassault Aviation) by Marcel Dassault, and led by son ...

and six new Cessna A-37B Dragonfly Counter-insurgency jets; plus several Bell UH-1B and UH-1H Huey Iroquois assault helicopters. The HAF was also reorganized, several new air bases were created and its name changed to only. These airplanes were used during the 1980s confrontation with the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Later that decade these were augmented or replaced with 11 ex-USAF OA/A-37B Dragonflies, 12 ex-USAF Northrop F-5E/F Tiger II interceptors, 12 new Embraer T-27 Tucano armed trainers and four new CASA 101BB-02 attack airplanes. They are supported with five ex-USAF

Lockheed C-130A Hercules The Lockheed C-130 Hercules is an American four-engine turboprop military transport aircraft designed and built by Lockheed (now Lockheed Martin). Capable of using unprepared runways for takeoffs and landings, the C-130 was originally design ...

transports, five armed MD500D and 10 new Bell 412SP utility helicopters, which are all in use to this day. In October 2014 Honduras received an Embraer Legacy 600, 16-seat VIP transport aircraft, which was valued at US$14 million. This aircraft (FAH-001) arrived at Toncontín airport on 15 October and was donated to the Honduras Air Force (Fuerza Aérea Hondureña, or FAH) by Taiwan. The VIP aircraft would also be available for medical evacuation in case of an emergency. Plans to buy two new Brazilian Embraer EMB-314 Super Tucano light fighters were also announced by the Honduran Foreign Ministry.

Bases

The FAH operates from four air bases at Tegucigalpa, Comayagua, San Pedro Sula, and La Ceiba. Additionally, three air stations located at Catacamas, Alto Aguán (bomb range) and Puerto Lempira airstrips serve as forward operations locations-FOL. Also a radar station operates at La Mole peak. All bases operates as dual civil and military aviation facilities.

Aircraft

Honduras Air Force - Embraer T-27 Tucano (FAH-258)

Current inventory

References

Bibliography

*Hagedorn, Daniel P. "From Caudillos to COIN". '' Air Enthusiast'', Thirty-one, July–November 1986. pp. 55–70. . * *Hoyle, Craig. "World Air Forces Directory". ''

Flight International ''Flight International'' is a monthly magazine focused on aerospace. Published in the United Kingdom and founded in 1909 as "A Journal devoted to the Interests, Practice, and Progress of Aerial Locomotion and Transport", it is the world's olde ...

'', Vol. 194, Number 5665, 4–10 December 2018. . pp. 32–60.

External links

Official Honduras Air Force pages

Official Honduras Air Force Academy page

{{Authority control Air forces by country Military of Honduras Aviation in Honduras 1931 establishments in Honduras