ALBROOK AIR FORCE BASE /

ALBROOK AIR FORCE STATION 

HISTORY

ALBROOK FIELD 

The need for an airfield on the Pacific side of the Panama Canal had become apparent to Army Air Service and Panama Canal Department officials early in the 1920s. By that time, it had been accepted by U.S. military planners that the original threat assessment for Canal defense was obsolete. No longer were naval bombardment and sabotage the only significant threats to the Canal. Rapid developments in naval aviation -- particularly the aircraft carrier and more advanced and efficient carrier aircraft -- made direct air attack on the Canal more feasible. As a result, the air defenses of the Canal Zone had to be upgraded to meet this new aerial threat. France Field on the Atlantic side was already proving to be too small to accommodate even the slowly growing Air Service presence in the Canal Zone during the 1920s. Its location offered no possibility for meaningful expansion, and its landing surface was already of questionable utility for the larger aircraft in use even at that time, not to mention the new bombers that the Air Service planned to field in the near future. Moreover, because it was situated on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus, Air Service leaders felt that it offered only imperfect defense against air attack from the Pacific side. It was determined, therefore, that a substantial new flying field must be established on the Pacific side in order to provide adequate defense against the growing threat of air attack.⁵⁹

Requests for needed expansion fell on deaf ears until the passage of the Air Corps Act of 1926. This act temporarily settled the long-running debate in military circles regarding the establishment of an independent Air Force. It stopped short of this reform, but did authorize the formation of the Army Air Corps, and advocated significant expansion for the Army's air arm. The most significant practical impact of the Air Corps Act was the approval of the Five-Year Plan for Army Aviation. This plan called for a doubling of the strength of the Air Corps over a 5-year period, and a corresponding expansion of the Air Corps' ground facilities. Two new installations were authorized in the plan. One was a new primary training field to be located in San Antonio, TX. The other was a new operational flying field on the Pacific side of the Canal Zone. The primary justification for the establishment of this new field was the Air Corps' plan to deploy a new bombardment group to Panama, and France Field's inability to accommodate it. The location chosen for the new field was the old Balboa Fill Landing Field, a rough auxiliary landing field that was then being utilized during the dry season.⁶⁰

The site of this field had once been a swampy tidal basin, but had been raised over the proceeding ten years by pumping in material from the Canal mixed with water (hydraulic fill), and layering dry material on top. By 1922, a temporary hangar was erected in the middle of the sod field in order to support emergency landing operations. A detachment of pilots from the 7th Aero Squadron, under the command of Lt. Frank. P. Albrook, became the active personnel for this new field, known as the 8th Air Park. In November 1924, it was redesignated as Albrook Field, in honor of the late Lt. Albrook, who had just died following a crash at Chanute Field, IL. When Albrook Field was selected for expansion under the Five-Year Plan, much filling and surfacing work remained before any real construction activities could even begin. The first appropriations for Albrook Field came in FY28, but covered only housing facilities, providing no funding for technical construction. Follow-on appropriations in FY29 addressed this lack, but significant delays in construction resulted from a series of disputes during the planning stage regarding the placement of the flight line. Actual construction on the field did not begin until 1930, and was not completed until 1932 -- five years after initial approval of the project.⁶¹

Major E. A. Lohman arrived at the expanded field in 1931 with a detachment of the 44th Observation Squadron from France Field, composed of eight officer pilots flying three old O-19 observation aircraft. Their practical duties were mostly limited to towing gunnery targets for the Coastal Artillery. Construction was still under way at this point, and even the official boundaries of the reservation were not finalized until 1932. Since no concrete runways had been provided in the original construction, these men were forced to operate off of the warm-up apron in front of the three original hangars, which were still completing construction when they arrived. With the arrival of the rainy season in 1932, regular flying operations were forbidden due to the extremely poor quality of the landing field, which became a muddy lake during heavy rains. In emergencies, the light O-l9s could use the paved warm-up ramp, but this was not employed for day-to-day flying. On 15 October 1932, following improvements to the drainage system on the field, the 78th Pursuit squadron deployed to Albrook from France Field with their P-12 biplanes. At this point, flying operations picked up, and tactical exercises took over from the aerial target duties that had dominated previously. Subsequently, the 78th was split into two squadrons, the 74th and 78th Pursuit Squadrons, which were augmented by the 44th Observation Squadron. These three squadrons at Albrook joined others at France Field to form the 19th Composite Wing, which comprised the entire Army Air Corps contingent in Panama. The total personnel strength at Albrook in 1934 amounted to 46 officers and 662 enlisted men, and increased only slowly until the build-up prior to World War II, although the planned squadron of B-10 heavy bombers did deploy to Albrook in the form of the 74th Attack Squadron in 1936. Throughout the period, Albrook Field and the 19th Composite Wing were plagued by insufficient manpower and funding support, and almost no improvements were made to the base itself. The much-needed runway paving project was not even begun until 1937, and was not completed until 1939. Nevertheless, Air Corps personnel succeeded in conducting regular tactical training operations. Perhaps the most important of these training activities were the annual Joint Landing Maneuvers conducted by Army and Navy forces, which served to enhance the readiness of the Canal's defenders, and to illuminate areas in which current defense dispositions were lacking.⁶²

CONSTRUCTION HISTORY

By the mid-1920s, rapid changes in the air defense environment of the Panama Canal had convinced Army Air Service leaders that a new flying field on the Pacific side of the Canal Zone was absolutely necessary to ensure the Canal's security. By that time, it had been accepted by U.S. military planners that the original threat assessment for Canal defense was obsolete. No longer were naval bombardment and sabotage the only significant threats to the Canal. Rapid developments in naval aviation -- particularly the aircraft carrier and more advanced and efficient carrier aircraft -- made direct air attack on the Canal more feasible. As a result, the air defenses of the Canal Zone had to be upgraded to meet this new aerial threat. France Field was already proving to be too small to accommodate even the slowly growing Air Service presence in the Canal Zone during the 1920s. Its location offered no possibility for meaningful expansion, and its landing surface was already of questionable utility for the larger aircraft in use even at that time, not to mention the new bombers that the Air Service planned to field in the near future. Moreover, because it was situated on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus, Air Service leaders felt that it offered only imperfect defense against air attack from the Pacific side. It was determined, therefore, that a substantial new flying field must be established on the Pacific side in order to provide adequate defense against the growing threat of air attack.⁵⁹

The passage of the Air Corps Act of 1926, and the resulting Five-Year Plan for Army Aviation, authorized the establishment of the new field. The site chosen for this field was the old Balboa Fill Landing Field, which had been redesignated Albrook Field in 1924.

The Balboa Fill Landing Field  

Albrook Field occupied a shallow valley that runs northeast-to-southwest from the western edge of Panama City to the eastern bank of the Canal. The site was originally a swampy, alligator-infested run-off basin for the Rio Grande and its three tiny tributaries -- the Maria Sala, Curundu, and Quebrada Plata rivers (Figures 2 and 3). Between 1912-1913, the Canal Department constructed a dike across the mouth of the Rio Grande to prevent flooding at high tide. The resulting swamp became a serious malaria hazard, and since the Dredging Division needed a place to deposit spoil from the Miraflores Locks project, this swampy area was selected. By 1915, the Dredging Division brought the original hydraulic fill project to completion, but it would only be the first of many (Figure 4). In 1922, the Air Service began to explore the possibility of employing the site as an auxiliary landing facility for the 6th Composite Group at France Field. A contract was let to the Al Geddes construction company of New York to make a dry fill of the area and level some small hills and other obstructions on the field. Three to 5 feet of dry fill were added on top of the hydraulic base, and Bermuda grass was planted in an effort to drive out the native grasses, which tended to clump and produce small hummocks that interfered with flying operations. Upon completion of the dry fill, a single temporary hangar was erected in the middle of the field, along with a simple fuel storage facility (Figures 5 and 6). A small group of pilots from the 7th Squadron under the command of 1st Lieutenant Frank P. Albrook was directed to establish the 8th Air Park at the new Balboa Fill Landing Field. This field then began to support emergency landing and take-off operations during the dry season, but was unusable during the rainy season due to excessive flooding and slow drainage. On 11 November 1924 the Balboa Fill Landing Field was redesignated as Albrook Field.⁸⁸

Original Construction Program

While the passage of the 1926 Air Corps Act granted the Army initial construction authorization for the establishment of the new Albrook Field, no funding was forthcoming for another two years. During that period, other airfield projects took precedence for the Air Corps' limited financial resources. When funding was finally approved for Albrook, more delays followed during the planning stage as a result of some debate over the placement of the flight line. When plans were finally approved, yet more delays ensued as the original contract bids all came in significantly over the approved appropriation, and the plan then had to be reworked to allow for less expensive completion. Construction actually began in 1930, and most was completed by 1932 when the flying field was finished. Some of the technical construction was further delayed, as two of the hangars remained uncompleted until 1934. Thus the entire construction process, from initial approval to final completion of the flying field, took eight years to complete -- a time span that compared very unfavorably with the 3-year average that might be expected in the continental U.S.

The original funding appropriation for Albrook construction passed through Congress in 1928, as part of the Army's construction program for FY29. This appropriation called for $1.9 million to be expended on a dispensary, barracks for 634 enlisted men, and married housing quarters for 90 NCOs and 71 officers. No funds were provided for technical construction at this date. Later that same year, this lack was made good through further appropriations for FY30 construction, which provided $1.5 million for the construction of hangars, field shops and warehouses, Headquarters and Operations buildings, radio buildings, an armament and parachute building, gas and oil storage facilities, and improvements to the flying field. A supplemental appropriation of $274,000 for FY30 provided funds needed for the construction of an Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO) Club, Officers' Mess, guard house, garage, quartermaster warehouse, theater, gymnasium, Post Exchange, fire station, and magazines. In addition, $51,000 was earmarked for the completion of a warm-up apron in front of the hangars.⁸⁹

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Extracted from Historical and Architectural Documentation Reports for Albrook Air Force Station and Howard Air Force Base, Former Panama Canal Zone, Republic of Panama, by Dr. Susan I. Enscore, Suzanne P. Johnson, Michael A. Pedrotty, and Julie L. Webster, RA, U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratories, September 1997. (Full citation in Links/Literature).  (Footnotes not changed and those pertaining to Albrook are located at the end of this section.)  (Not all photos in the original publication are included here.)  Portions of this report on Howard are included in a separate section on History of Howard Air Force Base.

The complete original version of this report may be viewed at https://www.denix.osd.mil/denix/Public/ES-Programs/Conservation/Legacy/DocReps/hadr1.html#toc