Fort Lawton Air Force Station

Fort Lawton Air Force Station (1960-1963) - A Cold War Air Force Radar Station first established in 1960 in Seattle, 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.


Fort Lawton Air Force Station Site with FAA Radar

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 a joint FAA/USAF operation. Initial equipment included the FAA ARSR-1C search radar and two USAF FPS-6A height-finder radars and an FST-2 coordinate data transmission system. A U.S. Army NIKE Missile Master site was co-located with the USAF site and two U.S. Army FPS-6 height-finder radars were placed to support that operation. A USAF FPS-26A height-finder radar was installed just months before the site was closed.

SAGE System Operation

Fort Lawton Direction Centers & Sectors
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-90DC

The Army established Army Air Defense Command Post S-90DC at the station for Nike missile command-and-control functions in the Seattle area. The station was initially an FSG-1 Missile-Master Nike Radar Direction Center. It was later equipped with the GSG-5(V) BIRDIE solid-state computer system.

Fort Lawton FAA Radar Site

The original FAA ARSR-1C radar was upgraded over the years to the ARSR-1E configuration. The signal processor was also upgraded from the original FST-2 to the FYQ-47 Common Digitizer (CD) and finally to the Common Digitizer-2 (CD-2). All ARSR-1/2s were then replaced by the Common ARSR (CARSR) radar by the end of 2015. The CARSR has a 200-nautical-mile (370 km; 230 mi) range, and shares transmitter components and software with the FAA's newest airport surveillance radar the ASR-11. The CARSR upgrade also replaces the legacy Common Digitizer-2 (CD-2) signal processors and associated radar data interfaces.

Gap Fillers

Fort 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.

**Fort Lawton AFS Gap Filler Radar Sites** (edit list)
ADC	NORAD	Location	State	Type	From	To	GPS	Notes
RP-1C	Z-1C	Chehalis	WA	FPS-14, FST-1	1960	1963	46.554697, -123.058112	Building Exists Tower may still exist

Closure

The Fort Lawton AFS was deactivated in March 1963 and the 635th Radar Squadron was deactivated. The FAA radar site continues to operate now with the CARSR Common ARSR radar set.

Fort Lawton AFS Major Equipment List
Search Radar	HF Radar	Data Systems
ARSR-1C FAA CARSR FAA FPS-14 GF	FPS-6A (2) USAF FPS-6A (2) USA FPS-26A USAF	FST-2/A/B USAF FSG-1 NIKE GSG-5(V) NIKE FYQ-47 FAA CD-2 FAA

Unit Designations
635th Aircraft Control & Warning (AC&W) Squadron (1960-1960) 635th Radar Squadron (SAGE) (1960-1963)

635th Assignments
1 Jan 1951 - Assigned at McChord AFB, WA, to the 505th AC&W Gp 6 Feb 1952 - Transferred to the 25th AD Jan 1953 - Transferred to the 4704th Def Wg 8 Oct 1954 - Transferred to the 25th AD 1 Mar 1960 - Transferred to Seattle ADS McChord SAGE Direction Center DC-12 11 Jun 1960 - Redesignated from the AC&W Sq to 635th Radar Sq (SAGE) abt Jun 1961 - Moved to Ft. Lawton AI, WA Mar 1963 - Deactivated 1 Jan 1973 - Reactivated at Dauphin Island AFS, AL assigned to the 20th AD 1 Jul 1974- Inactivated

Current Status

Operating as an unattended FAA radar site data tied to the JSS system.

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Location: Discovery Park, Seattle, Washington.

Maps & Images

Lat: 47.6575 Long: -122.41306

Multi Maps from ACME
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Elevation: .....'

See Also:

Sources:

Winkler, David F., Searching the Skies: the Legacy of the United States Cold War Defense Radar Program, USAF Hq Air Combat Command, 1997, 192 pages, Pdf, 164.
Cornett, Lloyd H. & Johnson, Mildred W., A Handbook of Aerospace Defense Organization (1946-1980), Office of History ADC, Peterson AFB, Colorado, 31 Dec 1980, 179 pages, Pdf, page 42, 155.

Links:

Visited: 20 May 2014