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Langley Air Force Base sits on the shores of the Back River at Hampton, Virginia, one of the oldest continually active military airfields in the world and now part of Joint Base Langley-Eustis. A single long concrete runway and full instrument approach support fast-jet operations by the F-22 Raptor and other Air Combat Command assets, making it an active, high-performance military field for any simulator pilot to treat with respect.
Langley is a United States Air Force base at Hampton, Virginia, adjacent to Newport News, operated by the US Air Force as part of Joint Base Langley-Eustis. It is one of the oldest facilities in the Air Force, tracing its origins to December 1916, and today hosts front-line fighter and intelligence units, including F-22 Raptors of the 1st Fighter Wing. For a simulator pilot it offers a historically significant, still very active military airfield with a single long, well-equipped runway.
The base lies on land between the city of Hampton to the south, the NASA Langley Research Center to the west, and the northwest and southwest branches of the Back River, in the Hampton Roads area of southeastern Virginia. As an active military airfield it sits within controlled airspace and is served by Norfolk Approach/Departure for arrivals and departures.
Langley has a single physical runway, 08/26, 9,988 feet long with a hard surface, lit, and equipped with an ILS on both directions.
Radio contacts published for the field include Approach/Departure (A/D) on 124.9 MHz, working with Norfolk Approach/Departure; ATIS on 27.01 MHz; Clearance Delivery on 118.85 MHz; Ground on 121.7 MHz; and Tower on 125 MHz. Additional frequencies are listed for base operations use, including OPS on 123.375 MHz (NASA Ops), PMSV Metro on 23.98 MHz, a Consolidated Command Post on 25.125 MHz, and PTD on 141.75 MHz. The runway is equipped with an ILS.
The airfield is bordered by the Back River on two sides and by the NASA Langley Research Center to the west, with the city of Hampton immediately to the south, all of which serve as useful visual landmarks when approaching the field.
Langley Field was established on 30 December 1916, before America's entry into the First World War, by the Aviation Section of the US Signal Corps, and was named for aviation pioneer and former Smithsonian Secretary Samuel Pierpont Langley. It was selected after a board of Army officers, reportedly posing as hunters and fishermen to avoid land speculation, scouted fifteen sites near Hampton in what was then Elizabeth City County, chosen for its flat, expandable, over-water location near an Army post. The field became one of thirty-two Air Service training camps built after the US entered the war in April 1917, hosting training squadrons including the 5th Aviation School Squadron, later redesignated the 119th Aero Squadron, along with several other Aero Squadrons. It served during the First World War as a flying field, balloon station, observers' school, photography school, and experimental engineering department, and for aerial coast defence. After the Second World War the field became headquarters for the newly formed Tactical Air Command, and in 1948 it was renamed Langley Air Force Base. It remained a Cold War air defence hub, and its successor command, Air Combat Command, is still headquartered there today. In October 2010 Langley Air Force Base was administratively joined with nearby Fort Eustis, under a 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission decision, to form Joint Base Langley-Eustis. In February 2023 an F-22 Raptor took off from the base and shot down a Chinese surveillance balloon, the type's first combat air kill. Langley is considered the oldest continually active air force base in the world and the oldest airfield in Virginia.
Langley remains an active US Air Force installation as part of Joint Base Langley-Eustis, home to the 633d Air Base Wing, the 1st Fighter Wing flying the F-22 Raptor, and the 480th Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Wing. It also hosts the recurring "AirPower over Hampton Roads" airshow in spring, featuring F-22 demonstrations, aerobatics and parachute displays. As a military base, access is restricted and prior permission is required for any flight operations.
