Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale
Encyclopedia
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
just outside Fort Lauderdale, Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. In 1942 the navy selected Merle Fogg Airport in Fort Lauderdale to expand into a naval air station
Naval Air Station
A Naval Air Station is a military airbase, and consists of a permanent land-based operations locations for the military aviation division of the relevant branch of their Navy...
for both pilot and enlisted aircrew training (i.e., gunners, radiomen) in Grumman TBF Avenger torpedo bombers flown by carrier-based US Navy flight crews and by land-based US Marine Corps flight crews ashore. Additional facilities were used to train aircraft maintenance and other ground crew support for the TBF and TBM series aircraft. Among the Avenger pilots who graduated NAS Fort Lauderdale was former President George H. W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
, from a class in 1943.
Several airfields in the immediate vicinity of NAS Fort Lauderdale were commissioned as Navy satellite or outlying fields. Several of these fields continue in operation today as civilian airports, such as Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport
Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport
Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport is a general aviation airport located within the city limits of Fort Lauderdale, in Broward County, Florida, United States, five miles north of downtown Fort Lauderdale...
and North Perry Airport
North Perry Airport
North Perry Airport is a public airport located in the City of Pembroke Pines, five miles west of the central business district of Hollywood, in Broward County, Florida, United States. The airport is owned by the Broward County Aviation Department...
.
Training was difficult and dangerous. From 1942 through 1946, 94 trainees lost their lives while serving at the Naval Air Station. Fourteen of those men made up a five-aircraft flight, now known as Flight 19
Flight 19
Flight 19 was the designation of five TBM Avenger torpedo bombers that disappeared on December 5, 1945 during a United States Navy-authorized overwater navigation training flight from Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale, Florida. All 14 airmen on the flight were lost, as were all 13 crew members of a...
, that disappeared while on a routine training mission on December 5, 1945. The need to train Avenger crews having passed, the station was decommissioned after 1946 and the facility was conveyed to the government of Broward County, Florida
Broward County, Florida
-2000 Census:As of the census of 2000, there were 1,623,018 people, 654,445 households, and 411,645 families residing in the county. The population density was 1,346 people per square mile . There were 741,043 housing units at an average density of 615 per square mile...
for use as a civilian airport. Today the facility is known as Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport
Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport
Fort Lauderdale – Hollywood International Airport is an international commercial airport located in unincorporated Broward County, Florida, three miles southwest of the central business district of Fort Lauderdale...
.