Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base

The United States Air Force's 147th Attack Wing (147 ATKW) is an Air National Guard (ANG) unit operationally-gained by the Air Combat Command (ACC). The 147 ATKW provides a 24/7 capability with MQ-9 Reaper Unmanned Aerial Systems. In its conduct of combat support sorties, the 147 ATKW provides theater and national-level leadership with critical real-time Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) and Air-to-Ground Munitions and strike capability. A collocated Air Support Operations Squadron (ASOS) provides terminal control for weapons employment in a Close Air Support (CAS) scenario, integrating combat air and ground operations. New construction designated under the "Grow the Army" project was completed in 2010. The project consisted of ten buildings for the Army National Guard and reserve units, including a battle command training center complete with state-of-the-art computerized equipment. "This will be a tremendous cost benefit to the Army Reserve as travel and logistical costs will be streamlined," noted Major General Eldon Regua, 75th division commander. The $80 million construction project includes a Battle Command Training Center, which simulates war conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan., a second Armed Forces Reserve Center with an assembly hall and offices, a Welcome Center, which will handle retention, recruitment and military identification services. The military ID center is expected to bring thousands of retired and active military annually to Greater Houston to renew or pick up IDs, Navy, Marine Corps and Army Reserve maintenance and storage facilities, a security checkpoint and the relocation of Coast Guard Sector Houston/Galveston from Galena Park to a new $20 million facility scheduled to be completed in 2013. Ellington now has five of the six military branches of the U.S. Department of Defense – Army, Navy and Marine Reserve units, Army and Air National Guard – in addition to the Coast Guard under the Department of Homeland Security, and NASA operations – on one base. The JRB is also the home base of a Civil Air Patrol composite squadron that routinely flies missions out of the Airport. ==History==

World War I In 1917, the U.S. government purchased of land from Dr. R. W. Knox and the Wright Land Company to establish an airbase in Houston. The location, near Genoa Township in southeast Houston, was selected because the weather conditions were ideal for flight training. Soldiers from nearby Camp Logan briefly assisted with the construction of the airfield when civilian workers went on strike. Soon after construction began on the airfield, the base was named after Eric Ellington, an Army pilot killed four years earlier in a plane crash in San Diego. • Post Headquarters, Ellington Field, November 1917 – January 1920 • 120th Aero Squadron (Service), November 1917 – February 1918 (Deployed to: American Expeditionary Forces, France) • 69th Aero Squadron, February 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "A", July–November 1918 • 70th Aero Squadron, March 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "B", July–November 1918 • 113th Aero Squadron, March 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "C", July–November 1918 • 232d Aero Squadron, April 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "D", July–November 1918 • 233d Aero Squadron, April 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "E", July–November 1918 • 250th Aero Squadron, November 1917 : Redesignated as Squadron "F", July–November 1918 • 272d Aero Squadron, April 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "G", July–November 1918 • 285th Aero Squadron, March 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "H", July–November 1918 • 286th Aero Squadron, March 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "I", July–November 1918 • 303d Aero Squadron (Service), June 1918 : Redesignated as Squadron "K", July–November 1918 • Squadron "L", August–December 1918 • Squadron "M", September–December 1918 • Squadron "N", November–December 1918 • 850th Aero Squadron, : Redesignated as Squadron "O", • Squadron "X", September–December 1918 • Squadron "Y", September–December 1918 • Squadron "Z", September–December 1918 • Flying School Detachment (Consolidation of Squadrons A-Z), November 1918 – September 1919 For the first months of operation, Ellington Field had no pilot fatalities. Within the year, however, this record changed for the worse. By August 1918, Ellington Field recorded the most pilot fatalities of the 18 U.S. Army Air Service training bases in the United States. Ellington was considered surplus to requirements after World War I and the base was inactivated as an active duty airfield in January 1920. A small caretaker unit was kept at the airfield for administrative reasons, but generally, the only flight activity during this time was from Army pilots stationed at Kelly Field who flew down to practice landings on Ellington's runways. With the end of World War II, Ellington served primarily as a reserve air base from the end of the war in 1945 until 1948. with the first class entering training on 8 August 1949. Navigator cadets trained in TB-25 "Mitchell" and T-29 "Flying Classroom" aircraft. The program was part of a two-base effort, in which Ellington would provide basic navigation training and its graduates would then be reassigned to Mather AFB, California for advanced training. Navigation training was enhanced at Ellington when the Air Force installed a microwave navigation system. To help navigators learn celestial positioning, a Houston resident paid for the construction of a planetarium at Ellington. The planetarium, which stood high and was topped by an aluminum dome, could hold 40 students. ====Air Defense Command / Aerospace Defense Command==== Ellington AFB was selected as one of the first of twenty-four Air Defense Command stations of the permanent United States surveillance radar network. On 2 December 1948, the Air Force directed the Army Corps of Engineers to proceed with construction of this and the other twenty-three sites. Radar facilities were activated in April 1952 with the 149th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron of the California Air National Guard operating an AN/CPS-6B radar set. On 1 February 1953 the 747th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron assumed operational control of the site. The station was designated P-79. In 1955 the Air Force placed an AN/FPS-8 at Ellington that subsequently became an AN/GPS-3. This set operated until 1960. In 1957 an AN/FPS-6 set replaced the AN/FPS-10 height-finder radar. In addition to the main facility, Ellington operated two AN/FPS-14 Gap Filler sites: • Fannett, TX (P-79A): • Van Vleck, TX (P-79B): By 1960 Ellington performed air traffic control duties for the FAA with an ARSR-1 radar, being designated FAA site J-15. On 31 July 1963, the site was redesignated as NORAD ID Z-79. The 747th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron was inactivated on 31 December 1969 and the FAA operated the ARSR-1 afterwards. Assignments: • 33d Air Division, 1 February 1953 • Oklahoma City Air Defense Sector, 1 January 1960 • 4752d Air Defense Wing, 1 September 1961 • Oklahoma City Air Defense Sector, 25 June 1963 • 31st Air Division In late 1972, the radar facilities at Ellington were reactivated by the now-renamed Aerospace Defense Command and given the new NORAD designation Z-240. Ellington became Operating Location "C" of the 630th Radar Squadron operating an AN/FPS-90 height-finder radar, which was later modified to an AN/FPS-116 circa 1977. The AN/FPS-116 was retired circa 1988. Active duty Air Force use of Ellington ceased on 30 September 1998 when an FAA ARSR-4 radar was activated nearby at Morales, TX (J-15A) as part of the Joint Surveillance System (JSS) and Ellington's remaining USAF presence remained strictly with the Air National Guard. ====Naval Air Reserve, Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard==== =====Naval Air Reserve===== The United States Navy opened a short-lived Naval Air Reserve Center at Ellington in 1957. After Ellington's transfer to CONAC in 1958, Air Force Reserve (AFRES) activities played a larger role at the base. In 1959, the 446th Troop Carrier Wing, Medium (446 TCW) hosted an "air rodeo" to determine which Air Force Reserve airlift squadron was the most accurate in the nation. Competition took place in the skies above Ellington and on the blacktop tarmac below. Forty aircrews from 14 AFRES air cargo wings from 12 different states participated in the unusual contest. During the event, aircrews dropped 260-pound bundles from C-119 Flying Boxcar aircraft flying high above the base and attempted to hit designated targets on the ground. Ellington's own 446th Troop Carrier Wing won the first annual competition. On 28 July 2017, the 147 RW began transition to the also unmanned and remotely piloted MQ-9 Reaper aircraft and began retiring its extant MQ-1 aircraft. With this transition, the 147 RW was redesignated again as the 147th Attack Wing (147 ATKW) and remains operationally gained by Air Combat Command. ===National Aeronautics and Space Administration=== ====NASA use==== From the 1950s through the 1970s, Ellington Field was utilized for pilot and navigator training for the active Air Force, Air Force Reserve, Air National Guard, and Naval Air Reserve, Marine Air Reserve, and foreign students. NASA established its facilities at Ellington as its base for astronaut flight proficiency training and specialized aircraft training in the early 1960s because of its proximity to the newly constructed Manned Spacecraft Center. T-38 Talon (T-38N) aircraft bailed from USAF and assigned NASA civilian registration numbers are the primary jet aircraft used for astronaut training at Ellington. From 1967, Ellington was used for the Apollo program's Lunar Landing Training Vehicle. Current status in a F-16 Fighting Falcon while visiting Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base, 2017 Ellington Field was officially inactivated by the Air Force in 1976 and all Air Force Reserve squadrons were transferred to other military facilities; however the Reserve components of the United States Armed Forces, such as the Texas Air National Guard, the Texas Army National Guard, the United States Army Reserve, United States Navy Reserve, United States Marine Corps Reserve, the United States Coast Guard (Coast Guard Air Station Houston) and the non-profit charitable youth program United States Naval Sea Cadet Corps still maintain a military presence at the base. In 1984, the city of Houston purchased the non-military portion of Ellington to use as a third civil airport, and it was renamed Ellington Airport on 14 January 2009, while the military cantonment area is known as Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base and Coast Guard Air Station Houston. ==See also==