Fort Lawton Air Force Station
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Fort Lawton Air Force Station (1960-1963) - A Cold War Air Force Radar Station was first established in 1960 in Seattle, King County, Washington. Relocated from McChord Air Force Base in 1960. Named Fort Lawton Air Force Station after the location. Initially assigned a Permanent ID of RP-1 and later a Sage ID of Z-1. Abandoned by the Air Force in 1963 but continued operation as Fort Lawton FAA Radar Site and is still active with updated CARSR radar equipment.
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Fort Lawton Air Force Station Site with FAA Radar in Center and Army Command Post off to the Right. The center radome is the ARSR-1C while the other two radomes are USAF FPS-6 radars. Two Army FPS-6 height-finders can be seen on temperate towers. The USAF Operations building is in front of the right-hand radome. The FPS-26 has not yet been installed in this photo, dating to between 1960 and 1962.
History
Established in 1960 as Fort Lawton Air Force Station manned by the 635th AC&W Squadron. The site was repositioned from its location on McChord Air Force Base to Fort Lawton in June 1960 as part of a joint FAA/USAF/U.S.Army operation to colocate and integrate long-range radar sites with U.S. Army Nike Missile Master command posts. Fort Lawton was one of six sites where new collocated facilities were to be built and one of three sites where the FAA would provide ARSR-1 search radars.
USAF would provide a SAGE System interface with an FST-2 coordinate data transmitter and two height-finder radars and pending the activation of this SAGE System interface it would install GPA-37 consoles in the Army command post to provide a manual intercept capability.
Initial equipment included the FAA ARSR-1C search radar and two USAF FPS-6A height-finder radars, an FST-2 coordinate data transmission system, and the interim GPA-37 equipment. The U.S. Army NIKE Missile Master complex was located just east of the USAF site and two U.S. Army FPS-6 height-finder radars were placed in the USAF compound to support that operation. A USAF FPS-26A height-finder radar was installed just months before the site was closed.
SAGE System Operation
| Assigned | Direction Center | Sector | ||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Mar 1960 - Mar 1963 | McChord SAGE Direction Center DC-12 | Seattle Air Defense Sector
The site began operation as a SAGE site on 11 Jun 1960 initially feeding the McChord SAGE Direction Center DC-12 at McChord Air Force Base. Fort Lawton Army Air Defense Command Post S-90DCThe U.S. Army Air Defense Command Post S-90DC became operational in February 1960 for Nike missile command-and-control functions in the Seattle area. The large command post building was located adjacent to the USAF Fort Lawton Air Force Station and initially housed the first production model FSG-1 Missile-Master Nike Radar Direction Center and a USAF GPA-37. It was later equipped with the GSG-5(V) BIRDIE solid-state computer system. The command post shared radar video produced by the FAA ARSR-1 radar with the USAF FST-2 SAGE System coordinate data transmitter. The FST-2 sent target data into the SAGE System computer at the McChord SAGE Direction Center DC-12 at McChord Air Force Base. The SAGE Direction Center provided target assignments back to the NIKE command post. The command post ceased operation in 1974 as the NIKE System phased out. Gap FillersFort Lawton AFS was responsible for the maintenance of one remote unattended gap-filler radar site. The gap-filler sites were placed in locations where the main search radar lacked coverage. These sites sent digitized radar target data directly to a direction center. Maintenance teams were dispatched from Fort Lawton AFS for regularly scheduled maintenance or when fault indicators suggested the site had problems. The Fort Lawton AFS gap-filler site is located on Crego Hill near Chehalis in Lewis County, Washington but little is known about its equipment or operation.
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