Mysterious airfield appears in the UAE

a reply to: Irishhaf

They've been talking for a long time about how vulnerable their bases are. They've opened several since 2008 that are in more remote areas.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Yea... I didn't care for the briefs we got at the deid, I'm mildly paranoid on a good day... ignorance would have been bliss about the distance between me and potential bad guys.

a reply to: Zaphod58

why is this even interesting to inform the ATS... ? bored much ?

a reply to: MarioOnTheFly

If you don't find an airfield that appears suddenly interesting fine. You don't have to click or reply. Other people do find it interesting.

a reply to: Zaphod58

And the point of shelters is that you can't see into them…

… from space. Especially military ones.

Those little "hangars" to the southwest indeed face on angle to their taxi way that leads to the runway. How many fighters in a squadron? They would be installed first as base defense, the "heavies" arriving later.

Not a mystery at all, this is a military air base. From the looks of surfacing to the north of the new "hangars" they are planning to expand it even further.

I see by the pic that the ramps leading to the big "hangars" aren't completed yet, so I take back what I said about aircraft in them. It is under construction, like you said.

a reply to: intrptr

And where has anyone said it's NOT a military base? Even the article says it's a military base. It's obvious just from looking at it that it's a miltiary base. You don't build shelters like that at a civilian airfield.

a reply to: Zaphod58

The article title.. "Mystery" airbase. Lets not be coy. Answer my question. Those little hangars at the southwest.. Active base defense squadron? Big hangars-- heavy bombers like B1's- 2's?

They don't need to hide transport or refueling planes in such giant hangars. Those are really big, big hangars, you know.

a reply to: intrptr

And what would you call it? There was a runway there one day, and a full airbase, with no name and nothing said about it there suddenly. I'd call that a mystery, even if you don't.

The UAE and their allies fly tankers, C-17s, C-130s and other large aircraft. They need areas that they can put the aircraft into to work on them. Some work requires the aircraft be completely inside the hangar to do the work on them. Some work requires the front end be completely within the hangar to do the work.

The shelters are there to park fighters in and protect them from the elements.

a reply to: Zaphod58

If you don't find an airfield that appears suddenly interesting fine.

but in the OP you said...

In recent days Google Earth is showing the complete base, and it's much larger than previously seen.

this would mean that it's been known about previously...but only recently seen whole on google earth...right ?


Still not interesting.

You don't have to click or reply

I know that...I just thought..there is an interesting story to it...since you made a thread about it.

a reply to: MarioOnTheFly

And it IS interesting to some people. If you aren't one, that's fine. But there's no need to make snide comments like that about it.

Yes, it was there before. As a runway, with a tiny parking area. Then suddenly there was a base with a huge parking area, hangars, shelters, and other buildings, and nothing is known about it. So yes, it IS a mystery.

a reply to: Zaphod58

The UAE and their allies fly tankers, C-17s, C-130s and other large aircraft.

"Other" large aircraft…?

a reply to: intrptr

Yes.

UAE:

C-130
CN-235
A330 MRTT
C-17

Oman:

Do 228
A320CJ
C-295
C-130

Saudi Arabia:

A340
A330MRTT
Bae 125
747
757
Boeing BBJ
E-3 Sentry
Gulfstream III, IV, V
C-130
MD-11

Those are just the other two countries this base is near.

As far as scale of the large "hangars" at the top of the photo we can compare them to the small single fighter shelters appearing at the bottom left of the base complex.



There are ten of them, shallow angled to the ramp, like these…

images

Compare the size of those little shelters to the size of the huge "hangars" at the top of the photo.

Whatever they plan on "basing" there they are going to be huge and a lot of them. Should be ready by the time we "Regime Change" Iran.

a reply to: intrptr

Apples and oranges. Shelters are for parking in, hangars are for working in. You don't put an aircraft into a shelter, and put it up on jacks and do a landing gear retraction, or do an engine change in it. Hangars are where you have shops in the back portion, plus offices, plus space to work on the aircraft, and many other things in there. A shelter, as you clearly showed, doesn't have any parts storage, shops, or anything but space to park the aircraft.

Since when do you take a large aircraft into a hangar through that tiny little taxiway on the corner of the building? If they were planning on putting large aircraft into them the taxiways would to along side the ends of it, to allow them more room to maneuver. The wings won't go past the end of the building. The more I look at it, the more it looks like it's the shops, supply point, and other support features, and hangar for fighters, not large aircraft.

a reply to: Zaphod58

If they were planning on putting large aircraft into them the taxiways would to along side the ends of it, to allow them more room to maneuver.

The Taxi ways to the large hangars aren't finished yet. There are two, one each, at opposite ends of the "hangars". There is plenty of room for them to maneuver, in fact they are close to the ends so they can go in and out quickly, exposing themselves less to prying eyes overhead.

You compare the scale of those "hangars" to the tiny little fighter shelters in my last post. Those "hangars" are Huge.

a reply to: intrptr

The taxiways aren't complete, but look at the placement of them. Instead of going past the ends, where it would be much easier to move, they're right on the corners. That tells me that they're going to be towing aircraft in, and they're aircraft that don't require a lot of maneuver room.

What part of "shops, parts, and offices are kept in hangars" do you not understand? In addition to the room required to park aircraft, and if they are designed for large aircraft, they would HAVE to be huge, they also need room to store parts, tear engines down and rebuild them, put the MOC offices, all into the building. Those take space.

If those are large aircraft hangars, you need room to put them all the way in. An A330 is NOT a small aircraft. The A330MRTT is almost 200 feet long, by almost 200 feet wide, and almost 60 feet tall. If you're going to put more than one aircraft in there at a time, that means you need a lot of space, on top of the shop space. That means you have a huge hangar.

Funny how the picture on the link looks like a circuit on a board.

a reply to: Zaphod58

The taxiways aren't complete, but look at the placement of them. Instead of going past the ends, where it would be much easier to move, they're right on the corners. That tells me that they're going to be towing aircraft in, and they're aircraft that don't require a lot of maneuver room.

The taxiways are as wide as the runway itself. No problem with wing span… the placement is an egress for landing from either end due to changes in the wind direction, imo.

Additional infrastructure and maybe runway access will be added later? They are grading everything around there to both sides and north of the shelters. Usually they feed aircraft taking off onto the end of runways , right?

An A330 is NOT a small aircraft. The A330MRTT is almost 200 feet long, by almost 200 feet wide,

How wide is a military runway?

a reply to: intrptr

The same as a civilian runway. Several military runways are civilian airport runways.

You don't put the taxiway there to get into the hangar. You put it off the end of it.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: intrptr

The same as a civilian runway. Several military runways are civilian airport runways.

You don't put the taxiway there to get into the hangar. You put it off the end of it.

The taxiways are as wide as the runway itself. No problem with wing span… and tarmac and taxi ways aren't finished.