Naval Air Station North Island

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Naval Air Station North Island

IATA: NZY - ICAO: KNZY - FAA: NZY
Summary
Controlled By		United States Navy
Facility Type		Naval Air Station
Location		Coronado, California
Commissioned		1917
Current Status		Active
Commanding Officer		Captain Anthony E. Gaiani
Elevation AMSL		317 ft (97 m)
Coordinates		32°42′00″N, 117°12′00″W
Runways
Direction	Length		Surface
Direction	ft	m	Surface
1L/19R	8,002	2,439	Concrete
1R/19L	8,002	2,439	Concrete
10/28	6,401	1,951	Concrete

Naval Air Station North Island (NAS North Island or NASNI) (IATA: NZY, ICAO: KNZY, FAA LID: NZY) is located at the north end of the Silver Strand in San Diego Bay, is the home port of several aircraft carriers of the United States Navy. It is part of the largest aerospace-industrial complex in the United States Navy, the 57,000-acre (230 km²) Naval Base Coronado in San Diego County, California.

The commanding officer of NAS North Island is also the Commanding Officer, Naval Base Coronado. As such, he commands or administers Naval Amphibious Base Coronado, Outlying Field Imperial Beach, Silver Strand Training Complex, Mountain Training Facility LaPosta, Warner Springs Training Area and Naval Air Landing Facility San Clemente Island. NASNI, with only its commands in the metropolitan San Diego Area, brackets the city of Coronado from the entrance to San Diego Bay to the Mexican border. North Island itself is host to 23 squadrons and 80 additional tenant commands and activities, one of which, the Naval Aviation Depot, is the largest aerospace employer in San Diego.

1 Organization
2 History
3 Tenant Commands
4 Ships
5 Squadrons
6 See also
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Organization

NAS North Island also operates two other airfields in the Southern California region. One is Naval Auxiliary Landing Facility (NALF) San Clemente Island, located 70 miles northwest of San Diego in the Channel Islands. The other is Outlying Field (OLF) Imperial Beach, located in Imperial Beach, 10 miles south of the base on the U.S.-Mexico border.

The air station resembles a small city in its operations. It has its own police and fire departments. It has large factories such as the Naval Aviation Depot, employing 3,300 civilians and its own parks, beaches, housing and recreation areas.

Its airfield has over 230 aircraft and its quay wall is homeport to two major aircraft carriers: Nimitz (CVN-68) and Ronald Reagan (CVN-76). Additionally, the base is home to the Navy's only Deep Submergence Rescue Vehicles, Mystic (DSRV-1) and Avalon (DSRV-2). The DSRV motor vessel support ships is also homeported here.

North Island is headquarters for four major military flag staffs including:

Commander Naval Air Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet, responsible for maintenance and training of all naval aircraft and aircraft carriers in the Pacific Fleet,
Commanders Carrier Group One and Seven and
Commander Cruiser Destroyer Group One.

With all the ships in port, the population of the station is nearly 35,000 active duty, selected reserve military and civilian personnel.

[edit] History

North Island was commissioned a Naval Air Station in 1917, called Naval Air Station, San Diego until 1955. On August 15, 1963, the station was granted official recognition as the "Birthplace of Naval Aviation" by resolution of the House Armed Services Committee.

The Navy's first aviator, Lieutenant Theodore Ellyson, and many of his colleagues were trained at North Island starting as early as 1911. This was just eight years after Orville and Wilbur Wright flew the first manned aircraft at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. At that time, North Island was an uninhabited sand flat. It had been used in the late 19th century for horseback riding and hunting by guests of J. D. Spreckles' resort hotel, the now-famous Hotel del Coronado.

North Island derived its name from the original geography. In the nineteenth century, it was referred to as North Coronado Island. In 1886, North and South Coronado Islands were purchased by a developer to become a residential resort. South Coronado became famous as the city of Coronado, but fortunately for the Navy, North Coronado was never developed. Instead, Glenn Curtiss opened a flying school and held a lease to the property until the beginning of World War I. In 1917, Congress appropriated the land and two airfields were commissioned on its sandy flats. The Navy started with a tent-covered city known as "Camp Trouble". As its name suggests, things did not always go well in the early days. The Navy shared the island with the Army Signal Corps' Rockwell Field until 1937, when the Army left and the Navy expanded its operations to cover the whole island. In 1914, then-unknown aircraft builder, Glenn Martin, took off and demonstrated his pusher aircraft over the island with a flight that included the first parachute jump in the San Diego area. The jump was made by a ninety-pound civilian woman named Tiny Broadwick. Other aviation milestones originating at North Island included the first seaplane flight in 1911, the first mid-air refueling and the first non-stop transcontinental flight, both in 1923. One of history's most famous aviation feats was the flight of Charles A. Lindbergh from New York to Paris in May 1927. That flight originated at North Island on May 9, 1927, when Lindbergh began the first leg of his journey. Forefathers of today's "Blue Angels", the three-plane "Sea Hawks" from VF-6B, the "Felix the Cat" squadron, were thrilling audiences with flight demonstrations as early as 1928. They demonstrated the training skills of Navy fighter and bomber pilots and on many occasions, flew their aircraft in formation with the wings tethered together.

The list of American military pilots trained at North Island reads like the Who's Who of aviation; however, America was not the only country interested in aviation early in the twentieth century. Six years before the Naval Air Station was commissioned, Glenn Curtiss, the famed aviation pioneer and later aircraft manufacturer, trained the first group of Japanese aviators at his flying school on the Island. Among them was a LT C. Yamada would later become infamous as the head of Japan's Naval aviation in World War II.

Even the base's first commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander Earl W. Spencer, Jr., USN, added a degree of celebrity to North Island. His wife was Wallis Warfield, a prominent socialite who was to remarry twice and finally become Wallis Warfield Spencer Simpson Windsor, the late Duchess of Windsor, for whom King Edward VIII gave up his throne in 1936.

During World War II North Island was the major continental U.S. base supporting the operating forces in the Pacific. Those forces included over a dozen aircraft carriers, the Coast Guard, Army, Marines and Seabees. The city of Coronado became home to most of the aircraft factory workers and dependents of the mammoth base which was operating around the clock. Major USO entertainment shows and bond drives were held weekly at the Ship's Service auditorium which was later replaced by the 2,100 seat Lowry Theater. Big band singers and movie stars were stationed here or on ships home ported here during the war years including Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Future television cowboy star of the 1950s and 1960s, Guy Madison, who starred as Wild Bill Hickok, was still Seaman Bob Mosely, a lifeguard at the NAS crews' pool. Stars like the Marx Brothers and Bob Hope appeared regularly at USO shows at the auditorium.

[edit] Tenant Commands

FAA Airport Diagram

Air Operations, Air Traffic Control
Commander, Carrier Strike Group Three (CCSG-3)
Commander, Carrier Strike Group Seven (CCSG-7)
Commander, Cruiser Destroyer Group One (COMCARDESGRU-1)
Commander Destroyer Group Seven (COMDESRON-7)
Commander, Destroyer Squadron Twenty-one
Commander, Naval Air Forces, Pacific Fleet (COMNAVAIRPAC)
Construction Battalion Unit 405 (CBU 405)
Deep Submergence Unit (DSU)
Defense Enterprise Computing Center Det San Diego
DSU Det Mystic (DSRV 1)
DSU Diving System Support Detachment
DSU Unmanned Vehicle Detachment
Fleet Aviation Specialized Operational Training Group Pacific
Fleet Imaging Center Pacific, San Diego
Naval Air Depot (NADEP)
Naval Air Technical Data and Engineering Service Command (NATEC)
Naval Communications and Telecommunications Station
Naval Leader Training Unit, Coronado
Naval Pacific Meteorology and Oceanography Center
Naval Special Clearance Team One
Naval Security Group Activity, San Diego

[edit] Ships

USS Nimitz (CVN-68)
USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76)

[edit] Squadrons

A C-5 Galaxy is loaded with people and equipment from the Deep Submergence Unit, Naval Base Coronado. The C-5 is bringing two Super Scorpio robotic rescue vehicles to Russia to assist in the rescue of AS-28, a miniature submarine of the Russian Navy.