It consisted of two separate two-runway airfields, built simultaneously just 4km apart. U.S. Navy use of the facility allowed the housing of rotational P-3 Orion squadrons, aircraft, flight crews, maintenance and administrative support personnel from their CONUS home bases for six-month deployments in support of antisubmarine warfare and maritime patrol missions until 2004. The ROCC remained active until the turnover of the facility in 2006. Navy gained jurisdiction; the installation was renamed U.S. That year the system got Chief of Naval Operations tasking to report whale detections. [22], The western Atlantic system consolidation was centered on the establishment of the Naval Ocean Processing Facility (NOPF) at Dam Neck, Virginia beginning with closure of NAVFACs Eleuthera and Grand Turk. During the height of the Cold War in the 1980s, Keflavik also hosted rotational E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft and KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft from CONUS to support the air defense mission and rotational HC-130 Hercules aircraft from RAF Woodbridge from the 67th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron to support their detachment of Keflavik-based HH-3 Jolly Green Giant and later HH-60G Pave Hawk helicopters in their search and rescue mission. Since May 2008 Keflavik has periodically hosted NATO fighter, AWACS and support aircraft participating in Icelandic Air Policing deployments. That approach raised the threat level to several SAC bases along the coast. The Keflavk Naval Air Station was built by the US Military during WWII. "[13] The cover extended to the names of the commands and training of personnel with overall commands designated Ocean Systems Atlantic and Ocean Systems Pacific, and terms such as Ocean Technician [OT] and Oceanographic Research Watch Officer given to Naval Facility personnel. New signal processing capabilities allowed for innovations such as the split array in which a single line array was divided into segments, each separately processed, then electronically recombined to form narrower beams for better bearing and cross fixes between arrays. [10][14] Despite being qualified for a warfare specialty and its symbols, the Navy personnel in the small SOSUS community could not do so for the sake of secrecy until the mission became public in 1991. The first detection of a Soviet nuclear submarine had been by United States Naval Facility, Barbados on 6 July 1962 of a submarine off the coast of Norway as it entered the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom (GIUK) gap. The Keflavk Naval Air Station played an important role during the Cold War, allowing the US to monitor Soviet activities in the North Atlantic. NAVFAC Lewes, Delaware closed that year. More than 100 Sailors attended the event, representing a majority of the forces that remain of a population that once exceeded 5,000 military and civilian personnel and family members. You can visit this colorful town on your way to or from Reykjavk. The Navy was requesting four fully functional cable ships, the modernized Albert J. Myer and Neptune and two large new ships. At that time the order for stations was increased from six to nine. In 1964 the project was placed under Industrial Manager, Potomac River Command and then Naval District Washington in 1965. In 2006, shortly after the US Military closed down its Keflavk Naval Air Station, located on Icelands southwest corner, photographer Bragi r Jsefsson visited the abandoned base to record the remaining structures. This museum is known as the Duus Museum. [citation needed], In 1974, the left-wing Government of Iceland's new proposal to close the base triggered a petition that garnered 55,000 signatures, about a quarter of the population of the entire nation. SOSUS assignment qualified as important as sea duty on a Cold War front line. The 85th Group continued to support rotational deployments until it was inactivated during a ceremony on 28 June 2006, as a result of the USAF reduction in forces in Iceland. Over the next four decades, the Defense Force was "at the front" of the Cold War and was credited[by whom?] The core fleet appears to be those listed below. PDF: NAVFAC Pacific Organizational Chart February 2022. wb. Naval Facility [NAVFAC], Keflavik, Iceland Tactical Support Center Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, WA Tactical Support Center .-.-.-. Returned to control of Icelandic Government on 7 April 1947; returned to joint Icelandic-USAF control, 23 May 1951. The system's true nature was classified with the name and acronym SOSUS themselves classified. Special guests included U.S. When USSThresher sank in 1963, SOSUS helped determine its location. Join Navy Veterans. NAS Keflavik employed approximately 900 Icelandic civilians who worked with military personnel, providing the services necessary to operate the base. Commander, Submarine Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet (COMSUBPAC) recognized the contacts as US submarines engaged in highly classified operations, and immediate changes were ordered for the reporting procedures. [3][22], In 1984 the first SURTASS vessel, USNSStalwart(T-AGOS-1) arrives at Little Creek, Virginia. Those were examined by the personnel trained to identify submarine signatures. Despite periods of realization both communities fell back into assumptions as a result of secrecy. Shore upgrades and new cable technology allowed system consolidation until by 1980 that process had resulted in many closures of the NAVFACs with centralized processing at a new type facility, Naval Ocean Processing Facility (NOPF), that by 1981 saw one for each ocean and mass closing of the NAVFACs. The system was capable of oceanic surveillance with the long ranges made possible by exploiting the deep sound channel, or SOFAR channel. with playing a significant role in deterrence. It involved everyone here and many higher headquarters elements to develop the plan and execute it.. During 1996 NAVFAC Keflavik Iceland closes and the new Fixed Distributed System Initial Operational Capability is accomplished. [22][23], The first systems were limited by the commercial telephone cable technology for the application requiring a shore facility within about 150nmi (170mi; 280km) from the array and thus within that distance from the continental shelf locations suitable for the array. NAVFAC Barbers Point closes with acoustic data directed to NOPF, Ford Island. That sonobuoy gave the aircraft cued by SOSUS access to the same low frequency and LOFAR capability as SOSUS. Ultimately that JMF itself was "remoted" across the Atlantic to Dam Neck. Under ADC until 1979 and under TAC until 1992. SOSUS was a case of new understanding of the environment and then application of largely existing technology and even equipment to the problem.[10]. The first experimental array was a six-element test array laid at Eleuthera in the Bahamas in 1951, followed, after successful experiments with a target submarine, in 1952 by a fully-functional 1,000ft (304.8m), forty-hydrophone array. Even when they knew they often did not know of its actual performance or exact role. Over 1,000 intercepts of Soviet aircraft took place inside Iceland's military air defense identification zone (ADIZ). Alternate or dual-use partnerships exist with a number of agencies and institutions. endobj NAS Keflavik, Iceland was located on the Reykjanes peninsula on the south-west portion of the island. Other services included a Navy Exchange, commissary, bank, credit union, hospital, beauty shop, tour office and morale flights to the rest of Europe and the United States. This, and later specialized, sonobuoys equipped with a small explosive charge could be used in an active mode to detect the echo off the target. Join VetFriends To: Reunite with Unit Buddies. An experimental six-element hydrophone array was installed on the island of Eleuthera in the Bahamas during 1951. SOSUS then became the major collector of Soviet submarine signatures and "boot strapped" itself to becoming the primary signature library for itself and becoming the major intelligence source for all other Navy acoustic sensor systems. This was the beginning of the Iceland Defense Force. It was implemented as a chain of underwater hydrophone arrays linked by cable, based on commercial telephone technology, to shore stations located around the western Atlantic Ocean from Nova Scotia to Barbados. U.S. 2nd Fleet (C2F) has temporarily established an expeditionary Maritime Operations Center (MOC) in Keflavik, Iceland, to provide the U.S. It has the typical cone shape of a volcano, thought I'm not sure if it is, and is a prominent sight as you travel along. Mark S. Laughton, the air stations final commanding officer. stream [15], The system's first station came on line before there was any signature library of Soviet submarine acoustic characteristics while submerged. Also Air Force component of NATO Iceland Defense Force. Those were followed by remoting Hawaii's Barber's Point in 1985, the Pacific Northwest arrays at Pacific Beach and Coos Head in 1987, and Bermuda in the Atlantic in 1992. These 15 companies will join over 50 other companies that were chosen this year. SOSUS grew out of tasking in 1949 to scientists and engineers to study the problem of antisubmarine warfare. New coaxial multiplexed commercial telephone system cable, designated SB, using a single wire for all hydrophones allowed major changes with the prototype installed in 1962 at Eleuthera. * United States Air Forces units changed from host to tenant status on 1 July 1961, when the U.S. LT Ernest CASTILLO, III, USN was the first CO May * NAVFAC Lewes, Del was back-fitted with DSA vernier and super-vernier equipment Sep * NAVFAC Keflavik, Iceland (Station AT-1) became operational Oct * NAVFAC Eleuthera, TWI (Station MIKE-SUGAR) became operational 1967 Jan * CAPT G COOK, USN assumed COSP Sep * NAVFAC Argentia, Newfoundland . This research and development effort was given the name Project Jezebel. [note 7] Systems terminating at Naval Facility Bermuda, Canadian Forces Station (CFS) Shelburne, Nova Scotia, Nantucket, and Cape May were installed during 1955. Extensive changes both with shore and sea assets take place over the following years as post Cold War missions change and systems are applied in new ways. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. An indication of ranges is the first detection, recognition and reporting of a Soviet nuclear submarine coming into the Atlantic through the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom (GIUK) gap by an array terminating at NAVFAC Barbados on 6 July 1962. There the contacts of multiple arrays were correlated with other intelligence sources in order to cue and provide the search area for air and surface antisubmarine assets to localize and prosecute. All the direct support through contracts with Western Electric, Bell Labs and ship schedules was under this management. Comments are closed. The two new ships were to be designed as modern cable ships, fully capable of cable and survey work. It was a ghost town caught in the gap between its old role as a naval base and unwritten future. If you worked at or supported the Naval Facility on NAS Keflavik, you are. NAVAL AIR STATION KEFLAVIK, Iceland - The Air Force Installation and Mission Support Center's Detachment 4 successfully led the award of three contracts recently, totaling $38 million to improve airfield infrastructure at Naval Air Station Keflavik,, . Both the full name and acronym were classified. . NAVFAC Keflavik played . For many, the hardest part is saying goodbye to host nation counterparts that have helped build the bases strong legacy. Before the nature of the arrays became known, many writers assumed SOSUS was a barrier system, rather than arrays giving surveillance of entire ocean basins. If you worked at or supported the Naval Facility on NAS Keflavik, you are more than welcome to join. For those of us that braved the Icelandic Domain in the land of fire and ice. An alert to Atlantic Fleet, Strategic Air Command (SAC) and the Pentagon came from "underwater listening devices at several secret Navy installations" that two Yankee class nuclear-armed submarines had left their usual patrol areas 1,200 miles out in the Atlantic and were getting dangerously close. 2 0 obj Under the indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts, over the next five years, each company will receive funds ranging from $1,000 to $950m in total to work on seven different ABMS product categories. Bragi graduated in photography from the Rochester Institute of Technology in the United States in 1987 and has since then been working as professional photographer. Proudly made in Reykjavk City. Air Force awards multiple contracts for airfield construction at NAS Keflavik. Comments . The Hartwell panel recommended spending of US$10,000,000 (equivalent to $113,890,000 in 2021) annually to develop systems to counter the Soviet submarine threat consisting primarily of a large fleet of diesel submarines.