Buckley Air Force Base

Buckley Air Force Base
Part of Air Force Space Command (AFSPC)
Located in: Aurora, Colorado
Buckley AFB, looking west with the Colorado Rockies in background. Aurora is in foreground.
Coordinates	39°42′06″N 104°45′06″W / 39.70167°N 104.75167°W / 39.70167; -104.75167 (Buckley AFB)
Site information
Controlled by	United States Air Force
Site history
Built	1942
In use	1948-Present
Garrison information
Garrison	460th Space Wing

Airfield information
IATA: BFK ICAO: KBKF FAA LID: BKF
Summary
Elevation AMSL	5,662 ft / 1,726 m
Coordinates	39°42′06″N 104°45′06″W / 39.70167°N 104.75167°W / 39.70167; -104.75167Coordinates: 39°42′06″N 104°45′06″W / 39.70167°N 104.75167°W / 39.70167; -104.75167
Website	www.buckley.af.mil
Map
BKF Location of Buckley Air Force Base
Runways
Direction Length Surface ft m 14/32 11,000 3,353 PEM
Source: Federal Aviation Administration

Buckley Air Force Base (IATA: BFK, ICAO: KBKF, FAA LID: BKF) is a United States Air Force base in Aurora, Colorado, that was established by the U.S. Army in 1943. The base was named in honor of World War I Army pilot First Lieutenant John Harold Buckley.

Buckley Air Force Base is an Air Force Space Command base that serves more than 92,000 active duty, National Guard, Reserve and retired personnel throughout the Front Range community. The host unit is the 460th Space Wing. Buckley AFB has air operations, space-based missile warning capabilities, space surveillance operations, space communications operations and support functions.

During the early years of World War II the city of Denver purchased a 5,740-acre (23 km²) parcel of land several miles east of the city and donated it to the Department of the Army. The site was named Buckley Field after 1st Lt. John Harold Buckley, a Longmont, Colorado, native, who was killed while on a combat strafing mission behind enemy lines in France on September 17, 1918.

Under the command of the 336th AAF Base Unit (Army Air Forces Technical Training Command), construction on the base began in early 1942, and that resulted in the construction of over 700 buildings. On 1 July 1942, the U.S. Army Air Corps Technical Training School opened there. It consisted of bombardier and armorer training for air crewmen on the B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bomber, also an Arctic Training School for aircrew headed for the Alaskan Wing of the Air Transport Command. Technical training at the base was under the jurisdiction of the Western Technical Training Command. During World War II, Buckley Field also trained over 50,000 airmen in initial basic training.