Once upon a time, George AFB was a thriving Air Force base, home to a wing of F-4 Phantoms among other things. I never really knew where George was, other than it was "somewhere in California". A couple of my buddies on Okinawa had come from George. I think they preferred Kadena over the desert.
As I'm learning, California is a very big state with varied landscapes and climates. One thing I can say for sure is that I'm really glad that I was never stationed at George AFB. I am not a big fan of the desert. And from that lead-in picture, you can see that George is in the desert. However, that's not the point of this post. (Author's Note: I "borrowed" that picture from the web of worldliness, for to illustrate the aero-planes among the cactus. This is not an Unofficial Guide to this former hang out for Phantoms and Phantom Phixers.)
My buddy Tuna has sent along some material regarding what used to be George AFB. Seems they store airliners out there. (Which can be inferred from that lead-in picture. Those are out-of-service airliners parked hither and yon. It's not "ground control gone wild".) In this overhead from Google Maps, you can see (in the yellow outlined areas) the aircraft being stored out there in the desert.
There are quite a few as you can see.
As I said, my buddy Tuna sent this link which I found to be a pretty good read. It involves airplanes and flying, two of my favorite topics. From time to time I'll be putting stuff up from Tuna, he hasn't failed me yet.
Maybe some day Tuna will tell us a flying story or three from his days as an NFO. We can only hope...
Thanks Tuna!
George was the military equivalent of The Big City to me when I was stationed at Boron AFS, a mere 30-some-odd miles north on 395. It was a coin-toss as to which commissary I shopped at, Edwards or George. We most often opted for George, given the base was smaller and the drive much easier.
ReplyDeleteAs for the desert... well, if you think George was bad, try bein' on a 75-man installation that's REALLY in the desert. I could push my motocrosser out of my garage in base housing and be in open desert in about 30 seconds... and I kid thee NOT. ;-)
Ain't it loverly? Base housing is at top right in the first photo, my house was the second one on the right as you entered the housing area. Thanks for the memories, Chris.
DeleteYeah, Boron AFS looks rather, remote.
DeleteGlad I could help with the trip down memory lane, but it's Tuna's link. I'm just the messenger.
My pleasure. Here's the military equivalent:
ReplyDeletehttps://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF8&z=14&ll=32.168355,-110.854154&spn=0.032041,0.058794&t=k&om=1
My last flight was to the boneyard, took Dragon 704 there- the one with my name on the side. All the S-3B Vikings are in the West/Northwestern-most corner of the graveyard, second plot to the east of the transient ramp.
Your last flight was to the boneyard?!? In the bird with your name on it?!? (I would have been afraid that they'd leave me there with the jet.)
DeleteWent over to that URL and had a look. Made me immensely sad to see all those proud birds just sitting there in the desert. Damn.
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