In the Category... How did these get here?!?!

[mrhenniger]

I was entering some new data into the Locator when I came across these planes...
Aerial Visuals - Location Dossier - Piney Island, North Carolina

So the question are... What are they doing there? What are they? Is this land part of MCAS Cherry Point?

Mike

[Rajay]

What is the dark strip around the "runway", some sort of canal or moat? I guess that would make sense to help keep the deer and othe wildlife off of the runway.

When I was in Daytona in the '80's, we mercilessly teased the Director of Maintenance at ERAU about the two F-16's that FANG had damaged in Jacksonville when some wild boar wandered out onto the runway. (He was a FANG maintenance officer, too) Apparently the boar were much bigger than the 4 lb. birds a jet engine is supposed to be able to ingest.

[coastdef]

The area is an "electronic practice range" for the military. The article below indicates the "airstrip" is landfill, but the topographic maps of the area show it as a landing strip. It may have been a misunderstanding of terminology; it certainly required a lot of fill to build a strip in that area, which is basically a huge swamp. That is the explanation of the water on either side; those were borrow areas for soil to build the strip up to a point that it would stay dry.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ ... island.htm

Regards,

Andy

[Ztex]

Piney Island training range...

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/piney-island.htm


Edit...Dang Andy beat me to it!

[mrhenniger]

Interesting. Thanks gents!

Mike

[Randy Haskin]

BT-11 is the first place I ever strafed in the F-15E.

Pretty decent range, although small.