Departure
96%
vs 95% ▲ 1
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
Adak Airport lies on the remote, treeless island of Adak in the Aleutian chain, the westernmost airfield in the United States with scheduled airline service. Built by the US Navy during the Second World War and later a major Cold War anti-submarine base, it now serves as a state-owned public airport supporting a small civilian community and twice-weekly Alaska Airlines jet service. For a simulator pilot it offers a striking combination of long ex-military runways, an ILS approach, and a genuinely isolated North Pacific setting.
Adak Airport is a state-owned, public-use aerodrome on Adak Island in the Aleutian Islands of Alaska, sitting west of the small community of Adak. Originally built by the US Navy as a wartime air station and later developed into a major Cold War naval air facility, it is now a civilian airport that holds the distinction of being the farthest-west airfield in the United States with scheduled passenger air service. Its long, wide, hard-surfaced runways and full ILS approach are a legacy of its military past and give it a character quite unlike a typical small Alaskan strip, making it an interesting and unusual destination for simulator pilots exploring the far North Pacific.
Adak Island lies far out in the Aleutian chain, well removed from other airports and any dense controlled airspace, with the airport situated to the west of the community of Adak. The field's remoteness means that, in practical VFR planning terms, it should be treated as an isolated island aerodrome with no nearby alternate fields; pilots should plan fuel and weather diversions accordingly given the wide expanses of open water and mountainous, often cloud-covered, terrain surrounding the island.
Adak has two physical hard-surfaced runways, both lit. Runway 05/23 is 7,835 ft (05) and 7,834 ft (23) in length, with an ILS available on the runway 23 approach. Runway 18/36 is 7,570 ft (18) and 7,569 ft (36) in length. Field elevation is 16 ft.
No specific communications frequencies for Adak Airport are published in the available data. An Instrument Landing System is available for the runway 23 approach, providing a glideslope-guided IFR let-down; pilots planning an approach should expect to rely on this ILS given the field's remote oceanic location and frequent poor weather.
No specific joining or circuit procedures for Adak are given in the available sources. Given the airport's long runways, ILS approach and remote setting, pilots should expect standard practices for an uncontrolled or lightly-used aerodrome, remaining alert for the twice-weekly airline jet operations and for the strong, often turbulent winds typical of the Aleutian Islands.
No published visual reference points are given in the available sources. The airport sits west of the community of Adak on Adak Island, within the wider setting of Kuluk Bay and the rugged, largely treeless volcanic terrain characteristic of the Aleutians, which serves as the principal visual landmark for locating the field from the air.
The airfield's origins lie in the Aleutian Islands Campaign of the Second World War. Following the Japanese occupation of Attu and Kiska in June 1942, US forces established Adak Army Airfield, known by the code name A-2 or 'Longview', on 30 August 1942 to provide a forward base from which to attack Japanese positions on Kiska. The site was a hastily drained tidal marsh; engineers built a dike and drainage canals, stripped the topsoil to reach firm gravel beneath, and laid a sand runway reinforced with pierced steel planking, allowing the first aircraft, a B-18 Bolo, to land by 10 September 1942. Through the autumn of 1942 the airfield rapidly grew to host B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers and P-38 Lightning and P-40 Warhawk fighters, with numerous US Army Air Forces bombardment and fighter squadrons rotating through during the campaign. After the war the airfield passed from the Army Air Forces to the US Air Force in 1947, and then in 1950 to the US Navy, which developed it into a major anti-submarine warfare base, deploying P-3 Orion maritime patrol aircraft against Soviet naval activity through much of the Cold War; as many as 5,000 US personnel and their families lived on Adak during this period. The base also played a role in early transpacific civil aviation: Pan Am flew a Seattle-Adak-Tokyo route in 1946 to demonstrate the viability of a great circle transpacific route for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. The Navy closed Naval Air Facility Adak on 31 March 1997, and the property was later transferred to the Aleut Corporation in 2004, with much of the surrounding land becoming a National Wildlife Refuge. The former base was designated a National Historic Landmark, as the Adak Army Base and Adak Naval Operating Station, in recognition of its wartime significance, although many of its original wartime structures have since been demolished or left in ruins.
Adak Airport is now operated as a civilian, state-owned public airport supporting the small remaining community on Adak Island. Scheduled passenger service is provided by Alaska Airlines, subsidized under the Essential Air Service program, with two flights a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays, operated using Boeing 737-700 or 737-800 jets to Anchorage. General aviation activity is limited, with no based aircraft recorded, and the field also sees a small amount of military traffic. Reeve Aleutian Airways had earlier served Adak from the late 1940s through to 2000, operating Douglas DC-3s, Lockheed Electra turboprops and later Boeing 727 jets on the Anchorage route before ceasing operations.