Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields:
Western Pacific Islands
© 2001, © 2010 by Paul Freeman. Revised 4/16/10.
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French Frigate Shoals NAF - Guam Northwest AAF / Guam Northwest AFB (revised 4/16/10)
Johnston Atoll Airport (revised 6/17/07) - Leone Airfield (added 12/24/09) - Midway Eastern Island - Palmyra Atoll Airfield (added 10/4/09)
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Leone Airfield, Taputimu, American Samoa
14.35 South / 170.78 West (Southwest of Hawaii)
A 1967 view by Don Cole looking south along the former runway of Leone Airfield (courtesy of the Feleti Barstow Public Library via Jonathan Westerling).
Jonathan Westerling reported, “Anyone who visits American Samoa today flies into Pago Pago airport –
originally built by the Navy at the beginning of World War II.
The Navy built a second airfield on Tutuila Island (American Samoa) at the beginning of the war.
This second airstrip was to be used for bomber & fighters & was constructed in the village of Leone in the southwest corner of the Island.
Known then as Leone Airfield, it was a secondary strip to the larger Tafuna Airfield which is today the international airport.
Nine months were spent constructing the runway which may have the distinction of seeing the least use of any in the Pacific!
The runway was listed with dimensions varying from 3,000'-6,000' long & 200'-400' wide.”
The first reference to the Leone Airfield is in a 1945 report “United States Naval History of Tutuila”
by USNR Lt. Cmdr. John Burke (courtesy of the American Samoa Historic Preservation Office, via Jonathan Westerling).
The report read, “In conjunction with the airstrip at Tafuna,
an emergency airstrip was under construction at Leone which was 300' by 3,000'.
It was started early in 1943 - probably in January.
The Leone airstrip was completed on 30 September 1943.
It was abandoned, however, in early 1945 because of turbulent air currents & lack of use.
Only 2 planes landed on the airstrip.”
The 1947 publication “Building the Navy’s Bases in World War II” (courtesy of Jonathan Westerling)
added “The 11th Battalion at Tutuila .... constructed Leone Airfield, a 6,000' by 400' foot bomber strip,
surfaced with volcanic cinders, and necessary supportive facilities.”
According to the American Samoa Government's “Samoan Historical Calendar”,
Ed McMahon, Johnny Carson's co-host on "The Tonight Show" was stationed there during his Marine service.
A 1984 aerial view by Don Cole looking west at the Leone High School,
whose campus sits in the middle of the runway of Leone Airfield (courtesy of the American Samoa Public Library via Jonathan Westerling).
According to the 1994 report “American Samoa In World War II” prepared for the American Samoa Department of Parks & Recreation,
“The outline of the Leone airstrip is still clearly visible.
At least 2 school buildings are located on the northern end of the strip & homes have been built on the southern end.”
According to Jonathan Westerling, “The schools which are located on the old runway are the Leone High School & the Midkiff Middle School.”
The 2001 USGS topo map of Tutuila shows the abandoned runway of Leone Airfield as a straight-line road between Leone & Taputimu (courtesy of Jonathan Westerling).
A September 29, 2009 aerial view of the remains of Leone Airfield.
Jonathan Westerling reported, “The Remnants of Leone Airfield can be seen from the air
with a straight clearance road starting from the WVUV-AM radio tower to Midkiff Elementary School.”
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Palmyra Atoll Airfield (P16, PLPA), Palmyra Atoll
5.88 North / 162.08 West (Southwest of Hawaii)
A June 30, 1944 Navy layout of the facilities on Palmyra (courtesy of Ron Plante) depicted a total of 3 runways.
In 1934, Palmyra Atoll was placed under the Department of the Navy.
When the U.S. Navy took over to use the atoll as a Naval Air Station on August 15, 1941,
the atoll was owned privately by American citizens, including Hawaiians.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Rear Admiral Claude Bloch announced the establishment of Naval Air Station Palmyra Island on 8/15/41,
officially opening the air station.”
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Two Army B-17s, the 1st of many, visited briefly from Hawaii for anti-submarine patrol soon after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
The 5,000' Runway 6 on Cooper Island was completed on 1/1/42.
Another 3,700' runway was built on adjoining Menge Island.”
The earliest aircraft accident to be recorded on the Palmyra airfield was in June 16, 1942.
A U.S. Army Air Force Douglas C-53 (41-20069) flew from Honolulu to Palmyra, where it was damaged beyond repair.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Eighteen 18 P-39s arrived on 10/24/42, only to depart on 11/2.
Long-range AAF B-24s also made frequent visits on the way to the South Pacific.
Contract civilian pilots from Pan American Airways, Consolidated Aircraft, and United Airlines,
flying cargo & personnel to the South Pacific, also refueled at Palmyra.”
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Runway 6 was expanded in 3/44, giving it a total length of 6,160'.
A 2,500' emergency runway on Sand Island was completed on 5/15/43,
all built of compacted coral.
The earliest depiction which has been located of the Palmyra airfield was a June 30, 1944 Navy layout (courtesy of Ron Plante).
It depicted a total of 3 runways: a 6,000' northeast/southwest strip on the east side of Cooper Island,
a 3,661' northwest/southeast strip on the west side of Cooper Island,
and a 2,400' northeast/southwest strip taking up almost all of tiny Sand Island on the southwest side of the Atoll.
A seaplane runway was depicted in the central lagoon,
and a CAA radio beacon was depicted on Paradise Island on the south side of the Atoll.
According to John Voss, Palmyra “was used as a fueling point for aircraft traveling between Hawaii & Australia during WWII.
Grumman F4Fs and Brewster F2As (VMF-211) were based at Palmyra for local defense.”
A closeup from the June 30, 1944 Navy layout of Palmyra (courtesy of Ron Plante) depicted the smallest of Palmyra's 3 runways,
labeled simply as a “2,400' landplane runway” which took up most of Sand Island, located southwest of the main Palmyra facilities.
It is not known if this 3rd runway was ever actually used.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Air-sea rescue was initiated at the station on 8/6/44, with the arrival of a PBY-5A.”
A June 30, 1945 Navy layout of the facilities on Palmyra (courtesy of Ron Plante) depicted 2 runways on the main island,
along with a large number of buildings, revetments, and other facilities.
An undated (WW2 era?) Navy layout of the facilities on Palmyra (courtesy of Ron Plante) depicted 2 rolled coral runways (measuring 5,360' & 3,600'),
along with a seaplane landing & takeoff area in the central lagoon, and an aeronautical radio beacon on Paradise Island to the southwest.
It described the field as having a control tower southeast of the runway intersection.
There were said to be airport buildings west of the field, but no hangars.
It also described the Sand Island Airstrip as having a 2,500' northeast/southwest coral runway, on the southwest corner of Palmyra.
An undated (WW2 era?) Navy aerial view (courtesy of Ron Plante) looking northeast along Palmyra's primary runway.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“NAS Palmyra Island was disestablished on 2/15/47,
but it had played an important role in the supply route to the South Pacific,
and was also a base from which patrol aircraft could protect the Hawaiian Sea Frontier.”
After the war, the former property owners (the Fullard-Leo family)
fought for the return of Palmyra all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court & won in 1947.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“The island was operated for a few years by the CAA before being abandoned.”
When Hawaii achieved statehood in 1959, Palmyra, which had been officially part of the City & County of Honolulu,
was explicitly separated from the new state as an Incorporated Territory of the U.S., administered by U.S. Department of Interior.
In 1962, the U.S. Department of Defense used the atoll for an instrumentation site during high altitude atomic weapon tests over Johnston Island.
The last recorded aircraft accident on Plamyra Island was on January 5, 1980,
when a Lockheed 18 Lodestar N163R owned by Fred Sorenson
was carrying 7 amateur radio operators from Honolulu to Palmyra.
While approaching the airstrip the pilot estimated a crosswind gusting to 15 knots.
However, below tree level the wind was calm.
The Lodestar swerved off the runway & collided with trees.
There were no fatalities but the aircraft was totalled.
N163R was pushed up into the trees on the southwest end of the runway, where it has remained ever since.
An undated (1980-2009) photo of the remains of Lodestar N163R off the southwest end of the Palmyra runway.
In July 1990, Peter Savio of Honolulu took a lease on the atoll until the year 2065 & formed the Palmyra Development Company.
A 1991 NOAA nautical chart depicted the single remaining runway on Cooper Island,
along with the radio towers on Paradise Island.
In January 2000, the atoll was purchased by The Nature Conservancy for the purposes of coral reef conservation & research.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
The Nature Conservancy cleared the 6,000' Cooper Island airfield in 2000.
Two August 2003 photos of a Gulfstream I on Palmyra's runway.
According to the 11/03 issue of The Coast Defense Journal (courtesy of John Voss),
“Today Palmyra has returned to jungle except for the 6,000' Cooper Island airfield the Nature Conservancy cleared.
The runways on Mengle & Sand Island are overgrown,
and the many wooden buildings remaining left by the Navy have long since rotted & collapsed.
A few abandoned concrete structures remain, but they too are mostly overgrown by jungle.”
A June 22, 2005 photo looking southwest along Palmyra's runway.
An August 1, 2005 aerial view of Palmyra showed the single remaining runway on Cooper Island.
Only a small northwest portion of the northwest/southeast runway remained recognizable.
An August 1, 2005 aerial view looking northeast along the single remaining runway on Cooper Island.
In November 2005, a worldwide team of scientists joined with The Nature Conservancy
to launch a new research station on the Palmyra Atoll in order to study Global warming,
disappearing coral reefs, invasive species and other global environmental threats.
In 2008, Dennis Girardot (Palmyra Station Manager for The Nature Conservancy) reported,
“We are still using one of the original runways here for flying scientists, donors and staff in to our facility here.
It is still loose coral & we need to do an upgrade on it in order to continue it's use from Hawaii.”
As of 2009, the “Palmyra (Cooper) Airport” is still listed with the FAA as a private airfield, with designators P16 & PLPA.
The remarks include, “Restricted, emergency only.”
The airfield consists of a single 5,000' treated coral Runway 6/24.
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Guam Northwest Army Airfield / Guam Northwest Air Force Base,
Agafo Gumas, Guam
13.62 North / 144.86 West (Southwest of Hawaii)
A circa 1945 aerial view (courtesy of Larry Miller & the 315th Bomb Wing Page)
looking northwest at a B-29 bomber, tail # 42-63674, of the 315th Bomb Wing, 501st Bomb Group
in flight over Guam Northwest Field.
Northwest Field was constructed in 1944-45 near Ritidian Point on the northwest end of the island of Guam.
Construction was accomplished by the Army Air Corp 1865th Aviation Engineering Battalion
and Navy Construction Battalions (SeaBees).
Deployed ground echelon personnel also assisted in construction, prior to the arrival of their Groups air echelon.
Guam Northwest Field became the home of the 20th Air Force, 315th Bomb Wing, equipped with the Boeing B-29 bomber.
The first units to arrive at Northwest Field were personnel of the 315th Wing HQ, 16th & 501st Bomb Groups in April, 1945.
The 331st & 502nd Bomb Groups arrived in May, 1945.
The first B-29s arrived there in May of 1945 after undergoing crew training in the states.
The field ultimately had 2 runways, the north & south runways.
The south runway was the 1st to be completed.
However, when the first 315th aircraft were deployed to Guam,
the south runway was still under construction & they had to land at nearby North Field
(which eventually became today's Andersen AFB).
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When the main air echelons of the 16th & 501st Bomb Groups arrived the south runway was complete, but the taxiways were not.
Aircraft had to be towed to their parking spaces over the rough coral.
By the time the air echelons of the 331st & 502nd Bomb Groups arrived, both runways were complete.
A 1940s aerial view (courtesy of Larry Miller & the 315th Bomb Wing Page) looking southeast at Northwest Field.
Note the large number of B-29s parked on the field.
The 331st Bomb Group used the ramp space in the center of the base,
the 502nd Bomb Group used the area on the east side,
and the 16th & 501st Bomb Groups used ramp space on the west side.
A B-29B of the 501st Bomb Group taking off from Northwest Field on June 26, 1945 (courtesy of Larry Miller & the 315th Bomb Wing Page)
for first Empire mission flown by the 16th & 501st Bomb Groups.
Note the B-29B's characteristic radar antenna “wing” visible under the fuselage between the main landing gear.
Northwest Field's 315th Bomb Wing was primarily equipped with the somewhat rare B-29B version of the bomber.
The distinction of the "B"-model was to save weight by removing all of the B-29's guns & sighting equipment except the tail gun.
The weight savings gave the B-29B a slight increase in speed & range.
The 15th & final mission of the 315th Bomb Wing & the final mission of the war
was a round trip of over 3,650 miles to the Nippon Oil Company at Tsuchizakiminato
on the north west coast of Honshu, the main island of Japan.
The B-29B also had 2 new radar units installed.
The AN/APQ-7 Eagle Radar was used for bombing & navigation,
and the AN/APG-15 was used for aiming the tail gun.
These 2 radar units gave the B-29B a distinctive shape
as the APQ-7 antenna appeared as a small wing under the fuselage (between the 2 bomb bay doors)
and the APG-15 added a ball-shaped antenna to the tail of the aircraft below the tail guns.
A circa 1945 photo of a B-29B's tail turret at Northwest Field (courtesy of Larry Miller & the 315th Bomb Wing Page).
Note the B-29B's characteristic spherical tail gun radome,
as well as the central 20mm gun (which was eventually removed, leaving the normal tail gun armament of twin 0.50-caliber guns).
A May-June 1946 photo by Ken Moore of a P-47 being boresighted at Guam Northwest Field (courtesy of Larry Miller & the 315th Bomb Wing Page).
Ken recalled, “The outfit was the 7th Fighter Command, 21st Fighter Group, 46th Fighter Squadron.
I was with the 46th Fighter Squadron & was an armorer.
We were the only Fighter Group attached to the 20th Air Force.”
The earliest aeronautical chart depiction which has been located of Guam Northwest Field
was on a 1958 World Aeronautical Chart.
It depicted “Northwest Guam AFB” as an active airfield.
The last aeronautical chart depiction which has been located of Guam Northwest Field
was on the June 1971 Hawaiian Islands & Marianas Islands Sectional Chart (courtesy of Ron Plante).
It depicted “Northwest AFB” as being open for emergency use only, and having 2 paved runways, with the longest being 8,500'.
John Voss recalled, “When I visited Guam I made an attempt to get on to Northwest Field but was unsuccessful
as the north end of the island fell under the jurisdiction of Anderson AFB as there was a lot of B-52 activity at the time ( i.e. Vietnam War).”
Northwest Field was closed as an airfield at some point between 1958-80,
as the 1980 USGS topo map labeled the runways of “Andersen Air Force Base (Northwest Field)” as an “Abandoned Airfield”.
Note the street grid for the huge ammunition bunker complex to the southeast of the airfield – built during the Vietnam War?
A 1992 aerial view by Ron Plante, looking northeast along the Guam Northwest runways, taken from a flying club Cessna 150.
Note the 2 radomes which were built along the south ramp.
A circa 2006 aerial view of Guam Northwest Field (courtesy of Ron Plante) showed the 2 runways, ramps, and numerous taxiways.
Note the huge ammunition bunker complex to the southeast of the airfield,
and the 2 radomes on the south ramp.
An undated aerial view looking southwest along Guam Northwest Field's runways.
An article in the 7/28/08 issue of Aviation Week magazine (courtesy of Ron Plante)
described how the Air Force was reusing Northwest Field for training purposes:
“Northwest Field, a 2,000-acre base used for World War II B-29 night bombing operations, was long deserted.
But its 8,400' twin runways, made with an extremely strong combination of crushed coral & limestone
with 1.5” of asphalt on top, and a maze of taxiways remain intact.
It’s now the heart of a rehabilitation and construction effort costing more than $200 million to provide barracks, vehicle facilities,
simulators, classrooms, armories, warehousing and training sites for these highly specialized forces.
A total of 89 projects encompass the building of 80+ facilities that include roads,
water tanks, pump houses, utilities as well as an electrical grid and substation.
The winding taxiways that once allowed the dispersal of hundreds of B-29 heavy bombers are now overhung by jungle.
In a clever piece of innovation, they are being used for practicing defense & reaction against convoy ambushes.
Other new construction includes weapons ranges, field exercise areas
and an unused residential area that has been turned into an urban assault course.
The south runway has been opened for helicopter & air-drop operations
and may eventually be used as a C-130 landing site.”
An undated aerial view looking south at Guam Northwest Field
from a 4/14/10 USAF news article about the field (courtesy of Ron Plante).
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French Frigate Shoals Naval Air Facility,
Tern Island, French Frigate Shoals
23.87 North / 166.28 West (Northwest of Hawaii)
Aerial view of French Frigate Shoals in 1943. National Archives photo.
This location is one of the most spectacular & distinctive airfields in the world.
It most closely resembles an aircraft carrier,
in that nearly every available acre of land of the island is taken up by its runway.
The French Frigate Shoals consist of a crescent-shaped atoll of small islands, 18 miles in diameter.
They are located 550 miles northwest of Honolulu.
The islands first played a part in WW2 when they were included in Japanese plans
to be used to refuel seaplanes from submarines in the sheltered waters of the atoll,
as part of their campaign to conquer Midway Island.
Such a refueling was successfully carried out in 1942 by two H8K Emily flying boats,
which was refueled by a submarine within the French Frigate Shoals atoll.
The seaplanes then mounted a bombing raid on Pearl Harbor,
although they were thwarted from hitting their targets by inclement weather.
Later in 1942, elements of the 5th Seabee Battalion arrived on Tern Island to begin construction of an airfield.
The island was only a few hundred feet long, yet was expanded by dredged coral
to create 3,100' x 275' runway & a ramp area sufficient for 24 single engine aircraft.
The expanded island's area encompassed 27 acres, of which 20 were taken up by the airfield.
On the meager remaining land, partially buried Quonset Huts were erected to serve as housing,
painted white to blend in with the surrounding coral.
The typical complement was 118 men, who rotated from Pearl Harbor on a three month tour.
The station was commissioned in 1943 as an auxiliary of NAS Pearl Harbor.
It served as an emergency landing strip & refueling stop for fighter squadrons transiting between Hawaii & Midway,
and provided surveillance of the surrounding area.
It was protected by a variety of anti-aircraft artillery.
After the end of WW2, the island was swept clean by a tidal wave in 1946,
after which point the base was closed by the Navy.
In 1952, the Coast Guard built a LORAN navigation beacon tower on the island,
along with a 20 man supporting facility.
The runway was used for a weekly mail & supply flight.
The Coast Guard installation continued in operation until 1979.
A 1961 NOAA aerial photo of French Frigate Shoals.
French Frigate Shoals Airfield, as depicted on the 1963 Pacific Enroute Chart (courtesy of John Voss).
Tern Island also played an interesting role during the early days of space flight.
During 1961-63, the Pacific Missile Range had a portable tracking station located at one end of the island,
operated by the Bendix Radio company, and staffed with 6-10 people.
PMR tracked not only the USAF Discoverer spacecraft but also the Soviet Union's space efforts,
including their first manned mission.
The PMR personnel lived in the Quonset Hut located about halfway down the runway,
and later, during the Starfish atomic tests, two house trailers were shipped to the island.
An Air Force C-130, conducting a run down the