History
Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Fort Worth was first known as Tarrant Field in 1932. The site adjacent to the field was selected in 1941 as a Consolidated Aircraft factory for the production of B-24 Liberator bomber aircraft. That site is now the location of a Lockheed Martin factory which manufactures the F-35 Lightning II.
Tarrant Field was renamed Fort Worth Army Air Field on 2 January 1942. The name was changed again in 1948, this time to Carswell Air Force Base, after Horace S. Carswell, Jr., a native of Texas and recipient of the Medal of Honor for his actions during World War II. Carswell Air Force Base was one of the first Strategic Air Command bases established in the Cold War period.
The base retained the name Carswell Air Force Base until 1993. At that time, the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) Commission decided to relocate assets from Naval Air Station Dallas to Carswell Air Force Base. Recommissioned on 1 October 1994 as Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Fort Worth (but also retaining the name Carswell Field), the 1,805-acre (7.30 km2) base was the first Joint Service Reserve Base in the United States. Two Marine Corps squadrons and a small contingent of Navy personnel had permanently relocated at that time and all moves were completed by 1998.
On September 20, 2009, the airport was used as a refueling stop for the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) piggybacking the Space Shuttle Discovery back to the Kennedy Space Center from Amarillo after STS-128. The short hops between refueling the SCA was due to the heavy payload still inside the orbiter, specifically the Leonardo (ISS module) that carried wastes from the International Space Station. After refueling the tandem flew to Barksdale Air Force Base, using most of the runway.
Naval Air Station Fort Worth, Joint Reserve Base, part of Navy Installation Command's Navy Region Southeast, is a joint defense facility which plays a pivotal role in training and equipping air crews and aviation ground support personnel. The Navy Fort Worth "team" ensures reservists receive quality training in preparation for mobilization readiness; here to serve the reservists, tenants, and surrounding communities while accomplishing its primary purpose of defense readiness for the United States.
Read more about this topic: Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Fort Worth
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