Slupsk-Redzikowo Airport
| Port lotniczy Słupsk-Redzikowo Air Base Stolp-Reitz |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
|
|||
| Characteristics | |||
| ICAO code |
|
||
| IATA code |
|
||
| Coordinates | |||
| Height above MSL | 25 m (82 ft ) | ||
| Transport links | |||
| Distance from the city center | 5 km east of Slupsk / Stolp | ||
| Street |
 / (earlier )
  |
||
| Start-and runway | |||
| 09/27 | 2200 m × 60 m concrete | ||
The Slupsk-Redzikowo Airport ( Pol. Port lotniczy Slupsk-Redzikowo , English Redzikowo Airport ) is a formerly of civilian Polish airport directly on the northwestern outskirts of Redzikowo / Reitz and five kilometers east of the center of Slupsk / Stolp . Until 2010, Slupsk was only used civilly for general aviation .
The area, which was previously mainly used as a military airfield , will serve the United States Navy as a location for ballistic missile defense from 2022 , which will be equipped with a land-based version of the Aegis combat system.
history
German time
The history of aviation in Stolp goes back to 1916, when the construction of the first airfield was started southwest of the city on the railway line to Stettin . Due to the Versailles Treaty , the facility under construction had to be demolished after the First World War . It was later opened as an airfield for civil air traffic on the Stettin - Stolp - Danzig - Königsberg route. It was expanded and used for military purposes during the Second World War and was called the Stolp-West Air Base during this time .
The current airport location in Redzikowo in the east of Słupsk was built between 1935 and 1939 as a new military airfield . The Stolp-Reitz air base was designed with a length of 1200 meters and the same width. There were three buildings on its premises for the command and administration, the teams and the news group. There were also five large airport hangars, the air traffic control, the shipyard and about twenty barracks.
During the attack on Poland , German air force units (such as IV./Lehrgeschwader 1 ) flew attacks on Poland from here . In the meantime, a Luftwaffe fighter pilot school was housed here until 1945. From May 1944, a group of former glider pilots were trained here under Captain Gottfried Kowatsch as self-sacrificing pilots for the so-called total deployment (suicide command without return). In the event of an Allied invasion of Western Europe, the ten trained volunteers with their planes full of explosives were supposed to dive close to the Allied ships until they hit. During the Allied landing in Normandy from June 6, 1944, the association was not used, but afterwards it was supposed to fly suicide missions against Russian power plants on the Upper Volga and in the Urals. The volunteers who were contractually committed and committed to the ship attacks refused to do so, referring to their written commitment to sole action against enemy ships. The association was dissolved a little later. Captain Kowatsch was transferred to the Wilde Sau fighter squadron (see Wilde-Sau night hunting procedure ) and fell during a mission on December 17, 1944.
At the end of the Second World War , the Stolp-Reitz air base played a role again as a front-line airfield. On March 8, 1945, all important military installations were blown up.
Polish time
Immediately after the occupation by the Red Army, the airfield was occupied by the Soviet military and used as a front airfield. In the years after the takeover by Poland, the barracks were rebuilt, the halls repaired and ground staff moved in. The airfield continued to be used for military purposes and was characterized as being highly qualified due to the international flight exercises that were carried out until 1993.
In the 1980s there was a limited amount of civil sharing for domestic flights.
According to an agreement from 2008 between the United States of America and the Republic of Poland , ten American ground-based interceptors are to be stationed here, which should be operational from 2015 and - together with a radar system planned in the Czech Republic - attacks to fend off so-called rogue states. This intention was initially abandoned by President Barack Obama in September 2009 , but signed in 2010 in a modified manner. The so-called Ballistic Missile Defense Agreement came into force on September 15, 2011.
Todays use
The operational readiness in Slupsk is to be achieved by the US Naval Missile Defense Association, the second land-based in Europe, equipped with a land-based Aegis combat system with the Mk 41 Vertical Launching System launchers and SM-3 Block IIA missiles, after delays in construction in 2022.
The groundbreaking ceremony for this took place in May 2016, shortly after the first missile defense base at the Deveselu military airfield in Romania was operational.
Web links
- Divine Wind , Der Spiegel , April 17, 1967
- Information from the Stolper Heimatkreis