The 1.2 million-acre base houses testing labs for advanced Navy and Marine aircraft.
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>>The two major earthquakes that struck last week near the town of Ridgecrest had their epicenter in the heart of the North Testing Range at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake — a 1.2 million-acre military aerospace research and development test center in the Mojave Desert that is critical to national defense.
Destruction from the earthquakes — a magnitude 6.4 Thursday, July 4 and a magnitude 7.1 Friday, July 5 — prompted the Navy Region Southwest commander, Rear Adm. Bette Bolivar, to declare the base “not mission capable” and to authorize an evacuation of non-essential personnel — including government workers and Department of Defense contractors — to Naval Base Ventura County. The Ventura County base is composed of three facilities — at Point Mugu, Port Hueneme and San Nicolas Island.
The two major earthquakes that struck last week near the town of Ridgecrest had their epicenter in the heart of the North Testing Range at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake — a 1.2 million-acre military aerospace research and development test center in the Mojave Desert that is critical to national defense.
Destruction from the earthquakes — a magnitude 6.4 Thursday, July 4 and a magnitude 7.1 Friday, July 5 — prompted the Navy Region Southwest commander, Rear Adm. Bette Bolivar, to declare the base “not mission capable” and to authorize an evacuation of non-essential personnel — including government workers and Department of Defense contractors — to Naval Base Ventura County. The Ventura County base is composed of three facilities — at Point Mugu, Port Hueneme and San Nicolas Island.
The earthquakes opened fault lines near major runways and laboratories used to test mission systems on some of the Marine Corps and Navy’s most advanced aircraft, including F-18s, AV8-Harriers and F-35s.
Ed Hackett, a contractor at the naval weapons station, is among those who are now working off base.
“We’re writing reports and doing certain analysis that are the unclassified part of the build-up process for the F-35 B and C flown by the Marine Corps and the Navy,” Hackett said Tuesday, July 9, from his Ridgecrest office.
Engineers and base personnel are inspecting the China Lake buildings for safety and functionality. Any delay in getting the base up and running likely will involve the sensitive measuring devices and technologies used to run the aerospace testing labs.
“A lot of sensitive and classified work has to be conducted in secure facilities,” Hackett said. “These ranges have systems that have to be highly calibrated for timing, distance, and altitude. All the missions systems eventually will have to be tested.”
Workers are now evaluating building that house the weapons systems laboratories and preparing the labs to resume testing, Hackett said.
“All the work, day-to-day, between the government workforce, the military and government contractors is geared to support national security,” Hackett said. “It’s about keeping those aircraft at the top of their mission capabilities.”
Since Monday, Navy personnel have been working with scientists and engineers from the United States Geological Survey to monitor the fractures and frequent aftershocks near the epicenter.
“The epicenter was in an area of mostly open fields in the base’s North Range,” said Helen Haase, a spokeswoman with Navy Region Southwest. “We first checked where the weapons are and everything checked out fine.
The earthquakes opened fault lines near major runways and laboratories used to test mission systems on some of the Marine Corps and Navy’s most advanced aircraft, including F-18s, AV8-Harriers and F-35s.
Ed Hackett, a contractor at the naval weapons station, is among those who are now working off base.
“We’re writing reports and doing certain analysis that are the unclassified part of the build-up process for the F-35 B and C flown by the Marine Corps and the Navy,” Hackett said Tuesday, July 9, from his Ridgecrest office.
Engineers and base personnel are inspecting the China Lake buildings for safety and functionality. Any delay in getting the base up and running likely will involve the sensitive measuring devices and technologies used to run the aerospace testing labs.
“A lot of sensitive and classified work has to be conducted in secure facilities,” Hackett said. “These ranges have systems that have to be highly calibrated for timing, distance, and altitude. All the missions systems eventually will have to be tested.”
Workers are now evaluating building that house the weapons systems laboratories and preparing the labs to resume testing, Hackett said.
“All the work, day-to-day, between the government workforce, the military and government contractors is geared to support national security,” Hackett said. “It’s about keeping those aircraft at the top of their mission capabilities.”
Since Monday, Navy personnel have been working with scientists and engineers from the United States Geological Survey to monitor the fractures and frequent aftershocks near the epicenter.
“The epicenter was in an area of mostly open fields in the base’s North Range,” said Helen Haase, a spokeswoman with Navy Region Southwest. “We first checked where the weapons are and everything checked out fine.”
Since Monday, Navy personnel have been working with scientists and engineers from the United States Geological Survey to monitor the fractures and frequent aftershocks near the epicenter.
“The epicenter was in an area of mostly open fields in the base’s North Range,” said Helen Haase, a spokeswoman with Navy Region Southwest. “We first checked where the weapons are and everything checked out fine.”<<
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