Former POW-1 DEW Line Radar Site

 former air force base, early warning radar

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Activated in 1957 following four years of onsite construction work, the POW-1 or Lonely Alaska radar site was an Auxiliary site in the POW Sector of the DEW Line. Located in an area which had previously been only swamp and tundra, the station gained its name from its almost total isolation.

As an Auxiliary DEW Line site, POW-1 was equipped with a single 25-module accommodation building "train", at the center of which was its AN/FPS-119 radar tower, and several outlying supporting facilities. The module train itself contained the recreational facilities, dining facilities sanitary and potable water treatment facilities, diesel power generators and radar equipment. Outbuildings included a single airplane hanger large enough to house the daily C-46 or DC-3 "lateral" flight aircraft in the event of foul weather or breakdown, two warehouses, and an large fuel or POL tank farm which stored the bulk fuels required for the site to operate through the winter when it was largely inaccessible.

Operational as part of the DEW Line through October 1990, POW-1 was deactivated and stripped of reusable materials before being sold largely "as-is" to various oil exploration concerns who utilized the site airfield, warehouses and hangar for vehicle and equipment storage. Re-activated for military use in 1994 as part of the US portion of the North Warning System, the site became home to an unmanned short-range radar station which was maintained by the US Air Force until its closure in 2007.

Since that date, the site has remained in an unmaintained state, with its airfield seeing occasional use by oil exploration firms.

lswilson.dewlineadventures.com/pow1.htm
www.airnav.com/airport/AK71
www.afcee.brooks.af.mil/ec/eiap/nepa/lonely/Lonely-16.h...
www.afcee.brooks.af.mil/ec/eiap/nepa/lonely/Lonely-17.h...