RAF Llandwrog

RAF Llandwrog
Near Llandwrog, Gwynedd in Wales
RAF Llandwrog Shown within Gwynedd
Coordinates	53°06′15″N 004°20′25″W / 53.10417°N 4.34028°W / 53.10417; -4.34028Coordinates: 53°06′15″N 004°20′25″W / 53.10417°N 4.34028°W / 53.10417; -4.34028
Type	Royal Air Force station
Site information
Owner	Air Ministry
Operator	Royal Air Force
Site history
Built	1941 (1941)
In use	1941–1946 (1946)
Airfield information
Elevation	3 metres (10 ft) AMSL
Runways Direction Length and surface 02/20  Concrete 08/26  Concrete 14/32  Concrete

Royal Air Force Llandwrog or, more simply, RAF Llandwrog is a former Royal Air Force station located at Llandwrog, southwest of Caernarfon, Gwynedd, Wales. The site opened in January 1941 as a RAF Bomber Command airfield for training gunners, radio operators and navigators and closed after the end of the Second World War in 1945. It reopened in 1969 and remains in civil operation today as Caernarfon Airport.

No. 9 Air Gunnery School was the first tenant of the base when it opened at the end of January 1941. It was equipped with Armstrong Whitworth Whitley bombers and Avro Anson training aircraft. Two days after flying commenced, the airfield was attacked by a single Junkers Ju 88 bomber that strafed the airfield, damaging one Whitley. Airspeed Oxford trainers from No. 11 Service Flying Training School were deployed to Llandwrog in mid-1941 to complete its students' night flying requirements. The following year, three of its Whitleys were deployed to RAF Driffield to participate in the first "Thousand Bomber" raid on Cologne, Germany on the night of 30/31 May 1942, although one aircraft failed to return.

Several weeks later the Air Gunnery School was disbanded and the field became a satellite of No. 9 (Observers) Advanced Flying Unit at RAF Penrhos. The unit conducted its night-flying training at Llandwrog and later moved its headquarters there. It was disbanded on 14 June 1945 and flying activities ended. No. 2 Air Crew Holding Unit then became the tenant. The airfield was reactivated for private aircraft in 1969 in preparation for the Investiture of the Prince of Wales at nearby Caernarfon Castle and it was occasionally used from then on. Eventually, this became frequent enough that the airfield became Caernarfon Airport. The runways and taxiways are still intact, although the original hangars have been demolished.