Langanes Air Station (ADC/NATO ID: H-2/H-2A) is a closed

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...

General Surveillance Radar station. It is located northeast of

Naval Air Station Keflavik Naval Air Station Keflavik (NASKEF) was a United States Navy air station at Keflavík International Airport, Iceland, located on the Reykjanes peninsula on the south-west portion of the island. NASKEF was closed on 8 September 2006 and its faci ...

, Iceland. The new station (H-2A) was closed on 28 June 2006 as part of the closure of United States military facilities in Iceland.

History

Langanes Air Station (H-2) was established in 1951, shortly after the return of United States military forces to Iceland. The site was operated by the

667th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron The 667th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron is an inactive United States Air Force unit. It was last assigned to the Air Forces Iceland, stationed at Hofn Air Station, Iceland. It was inactivated on 30 September 1988. From 1951-1988, the un ...

, and was equipped with

AN/FPS-3 The AN/FPS-20 was a widely used L band early warning and ground-controlled interception radar system employed by the United States Air Force Air Defense Command, the NORAD Pinetree Line in Canada, the USAF CONAD in the continental United State ...

and AN/FPS-20 radars. The Greenland, Iceland and United Kingdom air defense sector, better known as the

GIUK gap The GIUK gap (sometimes written G-I-UK) is an area in the northern Atlantic Ocean that forms a naval choke point. Its name is an acronym for ''Greenland, Iceland'', and the ''United Kingdom'', the gap being the two stretches of open ocean amo ...

, was routinely utilized by the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

's long-range heavy bombers and maritime reconnaissance platforms as a transit point towards the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

. From bases located at

Archangel Archangels () are the second lowest rank of angel in the Catholic hierarchy of angels, based on and put forward by Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite in the 5th or 6th century in his book ''De Coelesti Hierarchia'' (''On the Celestial Hierarchy'') ...

and

Murmansk Murmansk () is a port city and the administrative center of Murmansk Oblast in the far Far North (Russia), northwest part of Russia. It is the world's largest city north of the Arctic Circle and sits on both slopes and banks of a modest fjord, Ko ...

, Soviet aircraft would stream down to the North Cape in Norway towards the Gap which was use as a doorway to the vast Atlantic. Most of the Soviet missions were destined to probe United States’ air defense along the North Atlantic and after 1960 in the Caribbean where

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

, the USSR's most important satellite state outside continental Europe, was located. Such was the perceived threat from the Soviet incursions that it became a priority for NATO to demonstrate to that the strategic Giuk passage would be monitored at all times. In January 1961, the H-2 search radar bubble was blown down during a storm. The site was closed as a radar base and the 667th AC&W Squadron was moved to

Hofn Air Station Hofn Air Station (ADC/NATO ID: H-3) is a closed United States Air Force General Surveillance Radar station. It is located east of Naval Air Station Keflavik, Iceland. It was closed on 30 June 1992. History Hofn Air Station was established as ...

(H-3), where it replaced the 933d Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron. (note: the original site was used for several years as a communications site and for submarine detection) In 1992 "Langanes Air Station" was re-opened at a new site (H-2A) at Gunnolfvikursfjall, located 15km to the southwest on a cliff along the coast. The 667th Air Control Squadron operated an AN/FPS-117v5 radar from that site until 2006, when the station was closed. The original H-2 site today is abandoned, long since left to the elements. Some foundations remain however the location is desolate and windswept. The AN/FPS-117 radar tower remains at the H-2A site, but it is unused.

References

* A Handbook of Aerospace Defense Organization 1946–1980, by Lloyd H. Cornett and Mildred W. Johnson, Office of History, Aerospace Defense Center, Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado
Information for Langanes AS, IS
{{Aerospace Defense Command, state=collapsed Radar stations of the United States Air Force in Iceland Military installations closed in 2006

History

See also

References