Péronne-Saint Quentin Airport

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aérodrome de Péronne-Saint Quentin
Aérodrome de Mons-en-Chaussée
Péronne-Saint Quentin Airport (Somme)
Red pog.svg
Characteristics
ICAO code LFAG
IATA code XSJ
Coordinates

49 ° 52 '18 "  N , 3 ° 2' 30"  E Coordinates: 49 ° 52 '18 "  N , 3 ° 2' 30"  E
Height above MSL 143 m (469  ft )
Transport links
Distance from the city center 12 km southeast of Péronne
Street D 1029
Basic data
opening 1930s
operator Communauté de communes de la Haute Somme
Start-and runway
09/27 1390 m × 30 m asphalt / concrete

i1 i3


i7 i10 i12 i14

BW

The Aérodrome de Péronne-Saint Quentin , formerly Aerodrome de Mons-en-Chaussee is a French airfield in the region Hauts-de-France in the department of Somme in the fields of communities Estrées-Mons and Monchy-Lagache just south en Estrées-by -Chaussée, a district of Estrées-Mons. In both world wars, it served both warring parties as a military airfield . Today it is a civil airfield for general aviation .

history

The origins of today's airfield go back to the time of the First World War, when a field airfield existed immediately south of the road between Mons and Estrées in 1917/18. While there were only tents and barracks in the west, there were also a few hangars in the east.

The airfield was created for the British Royal Flying Corps (RFC), which used it from April 1917 to March 1918. After the occupation of the area during the German spring offensive, it was used by the German air force from April to August 1918 . In the course of the Allied counter-offensive, it was again an RFC base that used the airfield until mid-December 1918.

Shortly before the start of the Second World War, an anti-aircraft company was stationed on the old airfield at the end of August 1939 and remained here until the beginning of February 1940. At the end of the month there was also a flying unit of the French air forces with the bomber group GB I / 54. From mid-September, Mons-en-Chaussée became a base for the British Royal Air Force , which stationed Lysander of the 4th Squadron here until April 1940 .

After the armistice in June 1940, the airfield became a base for the German Air Force . The Germans expanded Péronne-Mons En Chaussé, which was the name at the time. These included two concrete runways in particular.

However, the airfield was initially only a reserve base. Only after the start of the Allied invasion of Normandy was the airfield used by the I. Group of Jagdgeschwader 5 (I./JG 5) between mid-June and the beginning of July 1944 and at the end of June the Bf 109G equipped with Bf 109G was also located here for almost a week II. Group of Jagdgeschwader 11 (II./JG 11). The last Luftwaffe unit stationed in Peronne was the second group of Jagdgeschwader 26 (II./JG 26) equipped with the Fw 190A in the second half of August 1944 .

After the airfield was taken by the US Army and briefly repaired, Airfield A.72 , its allied code name, was used by the Ninth Air Force of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) a good week after the Air Force had withdrawn . The P-38 of the 474th Fighter Group lay here for three weeks until the beginning of October 1944 . Subsequently, with a one-month break in April / May 1945, the 397th Bombardment Group, equipped with B-26 , was stationed here until December 1945 .

Although local groups favored the old Flamicourt airfield, which was much closer to Peronne, as the future civil airfield, the airfield near Mons-en-Chaussée was determined in Paris in 1947 as the future Peronnes airfield.

The airfield was only used for general aviation until the 1950s . In the middle of this decade the airfield was designated as a reserve base for NATO , for which a new jettable 2,440 m long runway was built in an east-west direction.

When France left the military structures of NATO in 1967, the airfield was again used as a purely civil aerodrome, and the area near Flamicourt, which was still used to a limited extent after 1947, was finally closed as an airfield.

Web links