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McConnell Air Force Base sits on the southeastern edge of Wichita, Kansas, and has been a working military airfield since the Second World War, when it served as the acceptance and transfer point for Boeing-built B-29 Superfortresses. Today it is home to Air Mobility Command's 22nd Air Refueling Wing, the Air Force Reserve's 931st Air Refueling Wing and the Kansas Air National Guard's 184th Wing, flying air refueling and airlift missions. For the simulator pilot it offers a pair of very long concrete and asphalt runways and a rich Cold War and Vietnam-era history.
McConnell Air Force Base is a United States Air Force installation on the southeastern outskirts of Wichita, Kansas, roughly four miles from the city's central business district. It is host to Air Mobility Command's 22nd Air Refueling Wing, with the Air Force Reserve's 931st Air Refueling Wing and the Kansas Air National Guard's 184th Wing also based there, and its primary mission is air refueling and airlift. Its long history stretches from a 1920s municipal airport through wartime B-29 production to its present role as a modern tanker base, making it an interesting stop for a simulator pilot interested in American military aviation.
The base lies four miles southeast of downtown Wichita in Sedgwick County, Kansas. It began life as Wichita Municipal Airport before being absorbed into military use, and it now operates as an active-duty Air Force installation rather than a civil field.
McConnell has two long parallel runways. The primary pair, 01L/19R, is 12,006 feet long with a hard surface, lit, and equipped with an ILS. The second pair, 01R/19L, is 12,000 feet long, also hard-surfaced and lit, but without an ILS. Both runways are substantial enough to support heavy tanker and strategic aircraft operations.
Radio services at McConnell include Wichita Approach and Departure on 120.6 MHz, ATIS on 124.65 MHz, Ground on 118 MHz, and Tower on 127.25 MHz. Additional frequencies include a Ramp/Boeing Ground channel on 123.125 MHz, Post Metro (PMSV) on 37.52 MHz, a Command Post channel (POST) on 31.1 MHz, a PTD frequency on 37.22 MHz, and an ACP channel for Kansas Air National Guard operations on 30.16 MHz. The field is equipped with an instrument landing system on runway 01L/19R.
McConnell's origins trace to October 1924, when Wichita hosted the National Air Congress, an event used to raise funds for a proposed municipal airport; ground was broken on 28 June 1929. In August 1941 the Kansas National Guard's 127th Observation Squadron became the first military unit based at the field, and from 1 March 1942 the Army Air Forces' Materiel Center, Midwestern Procurement District, was established there under a lease with the city. During the Second World War the airport, then covering some 1,337 acres with five runways, served as the acceptance and transfer point for Boeing-built B-29 Superfortress bombers produced at the nearby Boeing plant. The field was redesignated Wichita Air Force Base on 15 May 1953, then renamed McConnell Air Force Base less than a year later in honour of Wichita brothers Fred and Thomas McConnell, both Air Force pilots and Second World War veterans. Tactical Air Command took responsibility for the base on 4 July 1963 with the 388th Tactical Fighter Wing as host unit, and the 355th Tactical Fighter Wing was reactivated there in July 1964 flying F-105s; both wings deployed to Thailand during the Vietnam War, with the 355th moving to Takhli in November 1965 and the 388th to Korat in April 1966. As part of a 1994 Base Realignment and Closure move affecting March Air Force Base in California, the 22nd Air Refueling Wing was reassigned to McConnell. From 1996 the base served as the test site for the PACER CRAG avionics modernisation programme, and the following year it became the test unit for multi-point refueling.
McConnell remains an active United States Air Force base under Air Mobility Command, hosting the 22nd Air Refueling Wing alongside the Air Force Reserve's 931st Air Refueling Wing, with which it operates an associate arrangement in which the Reserve provides aircrews and the 22nd furnishes maintenance crews and aircraft, and the Kansas Air National Guard's 184th Wing. The base's stated mission is to provide global reach through air refueling and airlift operations wherever and whenever needed.
