Fort Yukon Air Force Station
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Fort Yukon Air Force Station (1958-Present) - A Cold War U.S. Air Force Station, part of the Alaska AC&W Radar Network. Initially functioned as a Ground Control Intercept (GCI) radar site, with a Permanent System ID of F-14. Later redesignated a surveillance site feeding manual track data to Murphey Dome Direction Center. Became a minimally attended radar site in 1984 and was redesignated as Fort Yukon Long-Range Radar Site with a JSS ID of A-01. Now feeds radar track data to the FAA Anchorage ARTCC (ZAN) and to the Elmendorf NORAD Regional Air Operations Center (RAOC). Active Long-Range Radar Site (LRRS) with an FAA ID of ZFYU.
HistoryConstruction began in June 1955 and was completed in February 1958 by the Manson-Osberg Construction Company for $5,068,139. The site became operational in April 1958 as Fort Yukon Air Force Station manned by the 709th AC&W Squadron which had been activated in January 1957 to operate and maintain the site. Initial equipment included the FPS-3 search radar and one FPS-6 height-finder radar. The radars were upgraded to one FPS-20 search radar and one FPS-90 height-finder radar. Later the FPS-20 was upgraded to a FPS-93A search radar. Radar track data was manually passed to the Murphy Dome manual direction center on voice circuits. The FYQ-9 Semiautomatic Data Processing and Display System became operational in July 1965, eliminating the need to pass aircraft track data manually. Fort Yukon Long-Range Radar SiteAn FPS-117 Minimally Attended Radar (MAR) was installed in the Jun-Aug 1984 and the site was operational on 14 Aug 1984 and re-designated as Fort Yukon Long-Range Radar Site. The Long-Range radar site was connected to the Elmendorf JSS Regional Operations Control Center (ROCC) which was been activated on 14 Jun 1983. The FPS-117 radar fed data to the ROCC FYQ-93 computers via satellite. The ROCC evolved into the Regional Air Operations Center (RAOC) which now operates with the Battle Control System-Fixed (BCS-F) FYQ-156 computer system. The RAOC is currently a component of the Alaska NORAD Region (ANR) and is operated by active Alaska Air National Guard members, Canadian servicemembers, and active duty augmentees. Physical PlantThe physical plant of the site was originally divided into the main site, a cantonment area, and a radio site. The main site housed the radar towers and the backup generators. The cantonment area housed the operations area, the enlisted quarters (BAQ), the bachelor officer's quarters (BOQ), the orderly room, the dining hall and other support areas in a single large two-story composite building. A separate recreation hall was connected to the composite building. No family housing was provided as this was considered a remote unaccompanied tour (1 year). A steel operations LRRS building was built at Fort Yukon for the transition to the FPS-117. The former AC&W composite building was left standing and boarded-up for years. The White Alice power plant building, billboard antenna also stood for years after being abandoned. One of the two original radar domes was modernized to house the FPS-117 and the other was leveled. CommunicationsA separate radio site housed the radio equipment for directing aircraft intercepts while the site functioned as a GCI site. Fort Yukon White Alice Communications SiteAfter HF systems proved inadequate for command and control communications, the Air Force implemented the White Alice Communications System (WACS). This was a system of tropospheric scatter and microwave radio relay sites constructed during the mid-1950s to provide reliable communications to AAC's AC&W system. The Fort Yukon White Alice tropo scatter site was activated on 25 Nov 1957. It was originally linked to Pedro Dome (124 miles) by a pair of 60' tropo billboard antennas. Two 120' tropo billboard antennas were installed in 1961-1962, to connect to the DEW-line station at Barter Island, some 250 miles away. Site facilities included a 4,960 square-foot equipment/power building, three smaller buildings and four POL tanks totaling 10,200 gallons. The specific links from Fort Yukon (FYU) as/of July 1977 were:
Fort Yukon WACS was inactivated on 10 Jul 1980 and replaced by an Alascom-owned satellite earth terminal. This site was the last White Alice site inactivated.
Current StatusActive long-range radar site but most of the old AC&W site buildings have been demolished. The site has also had an environmental remediation project that has further erased signs of the old AC&W site and the White Alice tropo scatter site. What remains is the FPS-117 Tower and Radome and the steel Composite building.
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