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NAS Fallon
Naval Air Stations like the squadrons that call them home, develop an identity and history over years that will have a lasting impact on the career and lives of those that serve there. For Naval Air Station (NAS) Fallon, that legacy ranks it at the forefront of naval aviation.
As told by Jim Dunn & Nicholas A. Veronico in their book High Desert Deployment: Navy Color on Display at NAS Fallon, NAS Fallon is approximately 55 miles east of the city of Reno. The Civil Aeronautic Authority, the forerunner of today’s Federal Aviation Administration, selected Fallon as a site for a future airport in March 1939 and negotiated with Churchill County to lease acreage for the airfield. The airbase came about in the early days of World War Two, when the US Army Air Forces realized it may need bases to defend against a Japanese invasion of the West Coast. A number of additional sites were selected on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountain range including Lovelock Minden, and Winnemucca – all within 130 miles of Fallon.
Fallon boasts 242 sunny days on average and only seven inches of snow per year as it lies in the rain shadow of the Sierra Nevada mountains, making the location ideal for flight training operations. Needing expanded training facilities, he US Army Corps of Engineers constructed two 5,200ft-long runways, which were finished in December 1942. Although the Army Air Forces did not occupy the airfield, the US Navy took up the lease in August 1943.
LCdr. Bruce A. Van Voorhis
During late 1943. a third runway was constructed and a torpedo and gunnery range was opened at Pyramid Lake, less than 60 air miles to the northwest. Naval Auxiliary Air Station (NAAS) Fallon was commissioned on June 10, 1944. The plan was to base one carrier air group (CAG) at the air station; however, a second CAG was also able to be accommodated to the field. Following the conclusion of World War Two, NAAS Fallon was placed in reserve status on June 1, 1946…