Departure
91%
vs 95% ▼ 4
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
Barking Sands Airport lies on the west shore of Kauai at Kekaha, Hawaii, and forms the airfield component of the Pacific Missile Range Facility (PMRF), a US Navy installation. Its single paved runway, oriented 16/34, sits on a narrow strip of coastal sand that has served military aviation on Kauai since the late 1920s.
Barking Sands Airport is a military airfield on the west coast of Kauai, in the town of Kekaha, and today forms part of the Pacific Missile Range Facility operated by the United States Navy. For a simulator pilot it is of interest chiefly for its long coastal history under a succession of names - Mana Airport, Barking Sands, and Bonham Field among them - and for its present role as an active naval range airfield rather than a civil aerodrome.
The field is located at Kekaha on Kauai's west coast, historically noted as being about eleven miles from Waimea. It sits on a low coastal sand strip and has for decades been associated with US military range operations rather than civil traffic; no specific civil airspace classification or nearby controlled airspace detail is given in the available material.
The airfield has one physical runway, 16/34, 4504 feet long on the 16 heading and 4493 feet on the 34 heading, with a hard surface and runway lighting on both directions. Field elevation is 20 feet.
Recorded frequencies for the field include a tower frequency of 126.2 MHz, UNICOM on 122.8 MHz, and Honolulu Center on 126.5 MHz, along with a range operations frequency of 32.285 MHz associated with the callsign Range Outrider. No instrument landing system is available.
No published joining or circuit procedures, circuit heights, or noise abatement details are given in the available material.
No published visual reference points are given in the available material; the field's location on the sandy coastal strip near Kekaha, roughly eleven miles from Waimea, is the principal geographic landmark noted historically.
The field originated as Barking Sands Field, placed under the control of the Territorial Air Commission by Executive Order 331 dated 12 May 1928, on a 550-acre site with a hard, level sand runway then some 13,728 feet long and roughly 2,000 feet wide, located about eleven miles from Waimea. It was not considered suitable as a commercial airport, though Hawaiian Airlines used it for passenger stops and Pan American Airways made occasional landings there until Lihue Airport opened in 1949. The airfield saw very heavy military traffic during the Second World War, and a series of land transfers and easements repeatedly altered the real estate assigned to the installation. Over the years it carried many names, including Mana Airport, Mana Airfield Military Reservation, Barking Sands Military Reservation, Kekaha Military Reservation, Barking Sands Airfield, Bonham Airfield, Bonham Air Force Base, Bonham Air Base, and Auxiliary Landing Field Bonham. On 15 December 1949 the Civil Aeronautics Commission notified the Hawaii Aeronautics Commission that Barking Sands Airport had been declared surplus to the needs of the Air Force and asked whether the Commission wished to acquire it.
The airfield now operates as part of the Pacific Missile Range Facility, a US Navy installation, and is not a public civil aerodrome. As a military range field, prior permission is required for any flight operations there.