Kalispell Air Force Station: Difference between revisions
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== [[Lakeside FAA Radar Site]] == | == [[Lakeside FAA Radar Site]] == | ||
[[Lakeside FAA RS ARSR-4 Radar|thumb|center|800px|Lakeside FAA Radar Site ARSR-4 Radar and Operations Building in Background.]] | |||
The upper radar site continued operation as a joint use JSS Site J-78, feeding radar data to FAA facilities and USAF direction centers. Operation and maintenance became an FAA responsibility. A small team of USAF technicians remained as an operating location to maintain and operate certain pieces of USAF equipment. The FAA renamed the site [[Lakeside FAA Radar Site]] after the town of Lakeside that had grown along Flathead Lake at the base of Blacktail Mountain. | The upper radar site continued operation as a joint use JSS Site J-78, feeding radar data to FAA facilities and USAF direction centers. Operation and maintenance became an FAA responsibility. A small team of USAF technicians remained as an operating location to maintain and operate certain pieces of USAF equipment. The FAA renamed the site [[Lakeside FAA Radar Site]] after the town of Lakeside that had grown along Flathead Lake at the base of Blacktail Mountain. | ||
Revision as of 07:51, 11 July 2019
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Kalispell Air Force Station (1961-1978) - A Cold War U.S. Air Force Radar Station first established in 1961 on Blacktail Mountain near present-day Lakeside in Flathead County , Montana. Named Kalispell Air Force Station after the town of Kalispell that was located at the head of Flathead Lake. Initially assigned a Permanent ID of TM-179 and later a Sage ID of Z-179. The site became an FAA-operated JSS site in 1978 with a JSS ID of J-78, an FAA ID of QLS and was renamed Lakeside FAA Radar Site after the USAF Air Force Station closed.
HistoryEstablished in 1959 as Kalispell Air Force Station manned by the 716th AC&W Squadron. Initial equipment included the FPS-7 search radar and two FPS-90 height-finder radar sets. SAGE System TransitionKalispell AFS was built for operation in the SAGE System and had no manual operation capability. The FST-2 coordinate data transmitter installation began in May 1960. The FST-2 equipment digitized the radar returns and transmitted the digital returns to the SAGE direction center. The FST-2 was a very large digital system using vacuum tube technology. Over 6900 vacuum tubes were used in each FST-2, requiring 21 air-conditioned cabinets, 40 tons of air conditioning, 43.5 kva of prime power. The FST-2B modification added two more cabinets but with newer solid state (transistor) technology to process coded responses from aircraft transponders. With the completion and testing of the FST-2 with the radar equipment and the direction center, the radar site was ready to begin SAGE System operation. SAGE System Operation
The site began operation as a SAGE site in 1960, initially feeding data to the Malmstrom SAGE Direction Center DC-20 at Malmstrom AFB. With the closure of DC-20 in 1969, Kalispell was connected to the McChord SAGE Direction Center DC-12 at McChord AFB in Washington State where it remained until it was closed. By February 1973 the USAF/FAA program to replace the unsupportable vacuum tube FST-2s was complete and Kalispell AFS would have been operating the replacement solid state FYQ-47 Common Digitizer. The FYQ-47 was in turn replaced by the CD-2 Common Digitizer in the early 1980s Kalispell AFS ClosureKalispell AFS and the 716th Radar Squadron were deactivated on 1 Apr 1978 and a portion of the upper site was turned over to the FAA. Lakeside FAA Radar Sitethumb|center|800px|Lakeside FAA Radar Site ARSR-4 Radar and Operations Building in Background. The upper radar site continued operation as a joint use JSS Site J-78, feeding radar data to FAA facilities and USAF direction centers. Operation and maintenance became an FAA responsibility. A small team of USAF technicians remained as an operating location to maintain and operate certain pieces of USAF equipment. The FAA renamed the site Lakeside FAA Radar Site after the town of Lakeside that had grown along Flathead Lake at the base of Blacktail Mountain. The USAF FPS-7B search radar was replaced by an FAA ARSR-3 search radar in the early 1980s and that was replaced by the current ARSR-4 which was commissioned in May 1998. The one FPS-90 height-finder that remained was modified to become a FPS-116 height-finder and that was removed circa 1988. The radar site data is now available to the USAF/NORAD Battle Control System-Fixed (BCS-F) operations centers (EADS & WADS) as well as the FAA Salt Lake City ARTCC (ZLC) and adjacent ARTCCs. Other federal agencies have access to the data under the Homeland Security umbrella. Gap Fillers
Initially, Kalispell AFS was not slated to support any remote gap-filler radar sites. Gap filler sites were usually placed in locations where the main search radar lacked coverage. With the closure of Yaak Air Force Station in 1960 responsibility for the maintenance of their gap-filler radar site at Eureka, Montana shifted to Kalispell AFS. The Yaak AFS site itself became an unattended gap-filler site also the responsibility of Kalispell AFS. These sites could send digitized radar target data directly to a direction center and/or to Kalispell AFS. Maintenance teams were dispatched from Kalispell AFS for regularly scheduled maintenance or when fault indicators suggested the site had problems.
Physical Plant The physical plant of Kalispell AFS was divided into an upper operations site on Blacktail Mountain and a lower cantonment area in the present day community of Lakeside. The cantonment area included the housing, administrative and support facilities for the troops and an adjacent 27 unit family housing area. The upper site housed the operations buildings, three radar towers, and two separate radio sites (transmitter and receiver) that housed the radio equipment for directing aircraft intercepts. Like most early radar stations, Kalispell originally had a radio transmitter site and a separate radio receiver site used by local controllers for voice direction of fighter interceptors to their targets. With the SAGE System, the SAGE Direction centers had the primary task of directing intercepts and the local radio sites were reconfigured, usually into a single site that was known as the Ground to Air Transmitter Receiver (GATR) site. The GATR site communicated with the interceptors from either the local site or the SAGE direction center via voice commands and/or a digital data link. A 15-mile access road connected the two areas.
Current StatusJSS Site J-78, Lakeside, Flathead County , Montana. An ARSR-4 FAA radar is currently in place on the upper site. The lower cantonment site and the family housing site are currently in use by Youth With a Mission, a Christian service organization.
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Sources:
Visited: Upper Site 9 Jul 2019, Lower site 15 Aug 2014
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