Puget-sur-Argens

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Validation date: 26 12 2013
Updated on: 16 08 2015
Views: 2361
See on the interactive map:

43°26'11"N 006°41'45"E
 
Runway: 11/29 - 1800meters/6000feet - earth
 
Puget sur Argens airfield (also known as Advanced Landing Ground St.Raphael/Frejus) was a temporary airfield 3 kilometers northwest of Fréjus airfield.
The airfield was built by IX Engineer Command just after Operation Dragoon, the Allied Landings in the South of France. It was likely built because intelligence reports indicated that Fréjus was mined and heavily defended. Additionally, the flying field was dug up with numereous trenches to avoid its use as an airfield. IX Engineeer laid out a 6000' Sod runway, roughly aligned east-west (11/29), making the airport operational for Twelfth Air Force combat aircraft by 26 August.
The airfield was not in use very long. The French 33e Escadre de Reconnaissance is known to have used the airstrip until somewhere between 3-8 September. By the night of 8-9 September it was appearantly no longer used, as Groupe de Chasse I/4 (P-47 Thunderbolts) used Fréjus Naval Air Station for a stopover instead.

No photos of the airfield while in use have been located
 
There is some controversy about this airfield. Some claim that it was officially labelled Y-12, it should therefore be considered the same airfield as Fréjus. I do not agree however, for several reasons.
Its documented orientation (08/26) and length (6000ft) would not fit on Fréjus airfield, so it must have been elsewhere and it was. 
It was located 3 kilometers (2 miles) away, across the Reyran Canal. Photography provided by IGN (see below) definitively proves this airfield was NOT at Fréjus airfield and not oriented 075 degrees as stated by IX Engineer Command, but rotated nearly 40 degrees further (110 degs).
Finally, the first twenty Y-codes for airfields in southern France were not assigned until October 1944, by which time this airfield had already been closed for over a month.

Today, nothing remains of the former airfield.


IGN photo taken in July 1945 showing not only the location, but also the proper orientation of the Puget-sur-Argens airfield (IGN, via Géoportail).

The same location in 2008 (Google Earth)

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