RAF Waddington

RAF Waddington
Near Waddington, Lincolnshire in England
E-3D Sentry Aircraft Lands at RAF Waddington
"Your Faith and Freedom"
EGXW Shown within Lincolnshire
Coordinates	53°10′21″N 000°31′51″W / 53.17250°N 0.53083°W / 53.17250; -0.53083Coordinates: 53°10′21″N 000°31′51″W / 53.17250°N 0.53083°W / 53.17250; -0.53083
Type	Royal Air Force station
Site information
Owner	Ministry of Defence
Operator	Royal Air Force
Website	www.raf.mod.uk/rafwaddington/
Site history
Built	1916 (1916)
In use	1916–1920 1937–present
Garrison information
Current commander	Group Captain R P Barrow OBE RAF
Occupants	5 (AC) Sqn 8 Sqn 13 Sqn 14 Sqn 51 Sqn 54(R) Sqn 56(R) Sqn 92(R) Sqn 8 Force Protection Wing No 2503 Sqn (RAuxAF) Regiment Air Warfare Centre 1Gp ISTAR Force HQ
Airfield information
Identifiers	IATA: WTN, ICAO: EGXW
Elevation	70 metres (230 ft) AMSL
Runways Direction Length and surface 02/20 2,743 metres (8,999 ft) Asphalt

Waddington International Air Show
Waddington Air Show in 2002 with the Air Warfare Centre in the distance
Genre	Air show
Dates	July
Venue	RAF Waddington
Country	U.K.
Established	1995
Attendance	140,000

Royal Air Force Waddington or more simply RAF Waddington (IATA: WTN, ICAO: EGXW) is a Royal Air Force station located 4.2 miles (6.8 km) south of Lincoln, Lincolnshire and 13.3 miles (21.4 km) north east of Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire, England. The site is owned by the Ministry of Defence and managed by the RAF.

The station badge depicts Lincoln Cathedral rising through the clouds.

Waddington opened as a Royal Flying Corps flying training station in 1916, they taught many pilots, including members of the American army, teaching students to fly a variety of aircraft and was transferred to the Royal Air Force on 1 April 1918 operating until 1920, when the station went into care and maintenance.

Squadrons operating during this time:

As part of the pre-war expansion programme the Waddington site was earmarked for development into a fully equipped Bomber Station. As it developed, RAF Waddington made an increasingly dramatic imposition on the surrounding rural landscape such as to the Lincolnshire Edge, a Jurassic limestone ridge, which forms the distinctive backbone of the county from Whitton on the Humber Estuary in the north, down to Grantham in the south. Along the top of the Edge a series of airfields were developed, including RAF Waddington, RAF Cranwell and RAF Scampton. They lie within an open landscape, consisting of rectilinear fields and few boundaries.