Check Six: New Fighter Facilities

Last week, your webmaster visited the Hawai‘i Air National Guard facilities at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.  If you haven’t visited the fighter compound area in the last year or so, the amount of construction going on will overwhelm you.  All the new facilities meet environmental standards and most will be electrically self-sustaining.  Finally – new facilities!

As luck would have it, the next day, Gordon Lau emailed Retiree News two very old photographs from the 1960s.  Gordon said he got the digital photographs from Ed Lee, another HIANG retiree who worked on the fighter maintenance complex for many years.

The first photograph shows the 154^th hanger under construction.  Missing is the supply building, the berm around the flight line, and many other things.  The old Sea Breeze – now Sam Choy’s is not there.

The second shows an aerial view of the compound, probably after the 1962 facility dedication.  You can see how the F-102s parked on the flight line at an angle.  Security was minimal – no fences anywhere.

But then again, it was over 50 years ago….

154th Hanger circa 1961

154th Compound circa 1963

click on the photographs to enlarge

Thanks to Gordon for sharing these photographs. He lives in Meadowdale Washington, moving there after retiring from the HIANG where he served as a loadmaster with the 204^th Airlift Squadron.  If you Tweet – check Gordon @islandr76.