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Médiouna Airfield

Médiouna Airfield
Twelfth Air Force - Emblem (World War II).png
Part of Twelfth Air Force
Coordinates 33°32′58.09″N 007°33′46.33″W / 33.5494694°N 7.5628694°W / 33.5494694; -7.5628694
Type Military airfield
Site information
Controlled by United States Army Air Forces
Site history
Built 1942
In use 1942-1943

Médiouna Airfield is an abandoned military airfield in Morocco, located in the Casablanca area.

Established as a French military airfield in French Morocco during the 1920s, after the Fall of France in June, 1940, the reconstituted Vichy Air Force established a military airfield at the facility for its limited air resources. During the Operation Torch landings in November 1942, 13 United States Navy F-4F Wildcats attacked the airfield at Médiouna and destroyed a total of 11 French aircraft, including six from GC II/5. and the airfield was seized by invading Allied ground forces.

Immediately after the landings, the United States Army Air Force Twelfth Air Force 47th Bombardment Group became the first USAAF A-20 Havoc group to participate in large-scale combat in the North African Campaign, using ferry tanks cross the North Atlantic. The group assembled at Médiouna before flying its first combat mission from Youks-les-Bains Airfield, Algeria on 13 December.

On the heels of the 47th, the B-25 Mitchell equipped 310th Bombardment Group moved from its temporary base at RAF Hardwick, England in mid-November. It also moved east quickly to Telergma Airfield, Algeria on 21 December.

A third group, the 81st Fighter Group was assigned to the field in early January 1943 flying P-39 Airacobras. Its ground echelon arrieved at the field in November, but the air echelon trained for several months in England. Once assembled, it moved to Thelepte Airfield, Tunisia at the end of January.


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