Former RAF Birch

 Second World War 1939-1945, former air force base

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RAF Birch is a former World War II airfield in England. It is located about 2 miles north-east of Tiptree in Essex.

Birch Airfield was assigned USAAF designation as Station 149.

Birch Airfield was allocated in August 1942 to the United States Army Air Force Eighth Air Force for development into a heavy bomber base but construction work did not get under way until well into 1943. In October 1943 the base was transferred to the Ninth Air Force.

Birch was constructed by the 846th Engineer Battalion, U.S. Army, and it was the last of the UK airfields to be completed by a unit of the U.S. Army. The airfield was built to heavy bomber standard specifications with three concrete runways, the main (08-26) being 6,000 ft, and two secondaries (02-20, 13-31) of 4,200 feet each. There were fifty hard standings of the loop type around the perimeter and two T2 hangars. Dispersed communal and domestic sites were built to provide accommodation for 2,894 personnel.

During the first week of April 1944 the personnel of the 410th Bomb Group arrived from Lakeland AAF, Florida to an airfield that was still unfinished. The group's Douglas A-20 Havoc light bombers were still in transit by ship. After about two weeks, the personnel of the 410th were transferred to RAF Gosfield and Birch was returned to the construction crews.

By the end of May, Ninth Air Force had no requirement for Birch, and the airfield was transferred back to the Eighth Air Force for use by its 3d Bombardment Division as a reserve airfield. When construction was completed in June, no operational units were assigned to the facility and throughout the balance of 1944 Birch only hosted a small USAAF station compliment to handle the occasional exercise or provided an emergency haven for battle damaged aircraft needing a place to land.

In September 1944 Birch was selected as a base for Douglas C-47 Skytrain groups of the 52d Troop Carrier Wing which were to move south from the Grantham area, but this never happened.

In March 1945 a large number of British Horsa gliders were moved to the airfield and the RAF No. 46 Group's 48,233, and 437 Squadrons of C-47s arrived from RAF Blakehill Farm. On 24 March the C-47s commenced taking off at about 6:00am each towing a glider, a total of 60 aircraft and 60 gliders to take part in Operation Varsity, the airborne crossing of the Rhine.

Most of the aircraft returned to other bases and the 46 Group withdrew from the base after a few days.

Thereafter Birch was largely abandoned, with only a few RAF personnel assigned to the facility for the balance of the war.

Birch was almost immediately placed on "care and maintenance" status by the RAF and was disposed of by the Ministry of Defense within a year after the end of the war and returned to agricultural use.

Most of the concreted areas have been removed for hardcore, leaving single tracked farm roads along the main runway, and both secondaries. A few loop hardstands remain intact off the remains of the single-tracked perimeter track along the north side of the airfield. However other than these farm roads, there is little remaining of the wartime airfield that was never used.