RAF Lakenheath

RAF Lakenheath stands on the Suffolk fens near the village of Lakenheath, eight kilometres west of Thetford and seven kilometres north-east of Mildenhall. Its perimeter touches Brandon, and the land was once used as a bombing range in the First World War. In 1941 the Air Ministry laid three runways, the longest at 910 metres, and the station became a satellite for Short Stirling bombers. No. 149 Squadron arrived in April 1942 and flew its first mission from Lakenheath three weeks later. Flight Sergeant Rawdon Middleton won a Victoria Cross when he brought a badly damaged Stirling back from Turin despite his wounds. The airfield closed in 1944 for conversion to a Very Heavy Bomber base and reopened in 1947. In July 1948 B-29 Superfortresses of the 2nd Bombardment Group landed as part of the early Cold War build-up. Two years later two Lockheed U-2s were flown in for CIA Detachment A, though they stayed only a month. A Military Air Transport Service flight vanished over the Atlantic in October 1956 with fifty-nine crew and passengers on board. Today the 48th Fighter Wing flies F-15E Strike Eagles and F-35A Lightning IIs from the same runways. The wing still operates four squadrons, including the 492nd and 494th, which once trained crews on the F-111F Aardvark. The base maintains high readiness for NATO and has flown long-range strikes to Libya and the Gulf. Around the airfield the flat fenland stretches away, marked by wartime dispersal pans and later taxiways.