RAF Church Fenton
| Leeds East Airport Church Fenton |
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| Summary | |||||||||||||||
| Airport type | Private | ||||||||||||||
| Owner | Makin Enterprises | ||||||||||||||
| Operator | Makin Enterprises | ||||||||||||||
| Serves | Leeds, West Yorkshire | ||||||||||||||
| Location | Church Fenton, North Yorkshire | ||||||||||||||
| Elevation AMSL | 30 ft / 9 m | ||||||||||||||
| Coordinates | 53°50′04″N 001°11′44″W / 53.83444°N 1.19556°WCoordinates: 53°50′04″N 001°11′44″W / 53.83444°N 1.19556°W | ||||||||||||||
| Website | leedseastairport.co.uk/ | ||||||||||||||
| Map | |||||||||||||||
 EGCM
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Leeds East Airport Church Fenton (ICAO: EGCM), formerly known as RAF Church Fenton, is an airport and former Royal Air Force station located 4.3 miles (6.9 km) south east of Tadcaster, North Yorkshire, England and 6.3 miles (10.1 km) north west of Selby, North Yorkshire, near the village of Church Fenton. The airport had a licensing application from The UK Civil Aviation Authority rejected. Which means plans to allow regular scheduled passenger flights and charter flights to various European destinations have been scrapped.
Plans for a new airfield adjacent to the village of Church Fenton were announced in June 1935, it was subject to protest from the local population particularly concerning the waste of valuable farming land and was close to an existing airfield 2 mi (3.2 km) away at Sherburn. Despite the protests construction started in early 1936 on the 260 acres (1.1 km2) site, a mixture of private and West Riding County Council-owned farm land.
On 1 April 1937 the station was declared open and on 19 April the first station commander Wing Commander W.E. Swann assumed command. Within two months No. 71 Squadron RAF had arrived with the Gloster Gladiator.
Opened in 1937, it saw the peak of its activity during the years of the Second World War, when it served within the defence network of fighter bases of the RAF providing protection for the Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield and Humberside industrial regions.
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