Decimomannu Air Base is an

Italian Air Force The Italian Air Force (; AM, ) is the air force of the Italy, Italian Republic. The Italian Air Force was founded as an independent service arm on 28 March 1923 by Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, King Victor Emmanuel III as the ("Royal Air Force ...

(''Aeronautica Militare'') air base located approximately north of Decimomannu a ''

comune A (; : , ) is an administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions () and provinces (). The can also have the City status in Italy, titl ...

'' in the

Province of Cagliari The province of Cagliari (; ) was a province in the autonomous island region of Sardinia, Italy. Its capital city was Cagliari. It had an area of , and a total population of 543,310 (2001). There were 71 ''comuni'' (: ''comune'') in the provinc ...

on the island of

Sardinia Sardinia ( ; ; ) is the Mediterranean islands#By area, second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, and one of the Regions of Italy, twenty regions of Italy. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, north of Tunisia an ...

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

. It is a military airport located northwest of the city of Cagliari, Sardinia, in a vast area between the towns of Decimomannu, Decimoputzu, San Sperate and Villasor. The airport is named after Colonel pilot Giovanni Farina, Gold Medal for bravery, died in combat in the skies of Sardinia 14 June 1942. The airfield is a front-line

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

training facility primarily used since 1979 for Dissimilar Air Combat Training (DACT) of various NATO air force fighter aircraft. Decimonannu was also the Home Base for the Taktisches Ausbildungskommando der Luftwaffe Italien and the base was used for training flights.

History

Decimomannu became in effect a military airport on 3 June 1940 with the transfer of the Italian 32º Wing from Cagliari Elmas. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

the airport served both

Axis powers The Axis powers, originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis and also Rome–Berlin–Tokyo Axis, was the military coalition which initiated World War II and fought against the Allies of World War II, Allies. Its principal members were Nazi Ge ...

and Allied forces. Between 1941 and 1943 the airport hosted the 36º Wing equipped with Savoia-Marchetti SM79 and Savoia-Marchetti SM.84 bombers. On 27 September 1941 the airport forces were involved in a bloody battle with the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

and the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

in the central Mediterranean. On 17 February 1943, the airport was bombed by the Anglo-American allies. In 1943 following the

Armistice of Cassibile The Armistice of Cassibile ( Italian: ''Armistizio di Cassibile'') was an armistice that was signed on 3 September 1943 by Italy and the Allies, marking the end of hostilities between Italy and the Allies during World War II. It was made public ...

, the airport came under the control of the United States Army who used it as a base for

Curtiss P-40 Warhawk The Curtiss P-40 Warhawk is an American single-engined, single-seat, all-metal fighter-bomber that first flew in 1938. The P-40 design was a modification of the previous Curtiss P-36 Hawk which reduced development time and enabled a rapid entry ...

fighter aircraft of the

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 ...

(USAAF).

Flickr - Israel Defense Forces - F-16 Takes Off as Part of IAF Delegation to Sardinia

Decimomannu airfield was used by the USAAF

Twelfth Air Force The Twelfth Air Force (12 AF; Air Forces Southern, (AFSOUTH)) is a Numbered Air Force of the United States Air Force Air Combat Command (ACC). It is headquartered at Davis–Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona. The command is the air component to U ...

320th Bombardment Group, which flew

B-26 Marauder The Martin B-26 Marauder is an American twin-engined medium bomber that saw extensive service during World War II. The B-26 was built at two locations: Baltimore, Maryland, and Omaha, Nebraska, by the Glenn L. Martin Company. First used in t ...

medium bombers from the field between 1 November 1943 and 21 September 1944. The American author

Joseph Heller Joseph Heller (May 1, 1923 – December 12, 1999) was an American author of novels, short stories, plays, and screenplays. His best-known work is the 1961 novel '' Catch-22'', a satire on war and bureaucracy, whose title has become a synonym for ...

, while writing his novel '' Catch-22'', was inspired by some events that happened in the Decimomannu airbase in 1944. In April 1957 an "Air Weapons Training Installation" (AWTI) unit was established by the

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; ) 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 environmental commands within the unified Can ...

(RCAF). In December 1959 an agreement was signed between Italy, Canada and

West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...

, which regulated the use of the air base and firing ranges associated with it. Over the years the base saw a growing increase in flights. Decimomannu during 1970 and 2000 was consecrated as the airport with the highest number of takeoffs and landings in Europe, with an average of about 60000 movements per year, equal to about 450 daily movements. Currently, the main user of the airport is the

. The

German Air Force The German Air Force (, ) is the aerial warfare branch of the , the armed forces of Germany. The German Air Force (as part of the ) was founded in 1956 during the era of the Cold War as the aerial warfare branch of the armed forces of West Ger ...

(Luftwaffe) left the airport in December 2016 because of the restrictions about flying and rising costs.

Facilities

The airport resides at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...

of above

mean sea level A mean is a quantity representing the "center" of a collection of numbers and is intermediate to the extreme values of the set of numbers. There are several kinds of means (or "measures of central tendency") in mathematics, especially in statist ...

. It has two

asphalt Asphalt most often refers to: * Bitumen, also known as "liquid asphalt cement" or simply "asphalt", a viscous form of petroleum mainly used as a binder in asphalt concrete * Asphalt concrete, a mixture of bitumen with coarse and fine aggregates, u ...

paved

runway In aviation, a runway is an elongated, rectangular surface designed for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft. Runways may be a human-made surface (often asphalt concrete, asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both) or a natural surface (sod, ...

s: 17L/35R measuring and 17R/35L measuring .

References

External links

* * {{authority control Airfields of the United States Army Air Forces in Italy Italian airbases Italian Air Force Airports established in 1943 Training establishments of the German Air Force

History

Facilities

See also

References

External links