Armstrong, ON

1994 - General History - Paul Ozorak

In 1952, the United States Air Force's Air Defence Command opened a radar station at this north-western Ontario town. Armstrong Air Station was one of the many posts on the radar warning fence called the Pinetree line. The station was home to the 914th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron which had as some of its equipment two Search and one Height-Finder radar. Unidentified aircraft picked up by Armstrong could be challenged by interceptors guided by the 914th's Fighter Control Operators. These interceptors were based at Duluth International airport in Minnesota.

The USAF operated Armstrong Air Station until November 1962. That month, it was transferred to the RCAF who promptly re-named the site RCAF Station Armstrong and the operating unit, 38 Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron. Besides a new name, new radar and communications equipment was acquired in the 1960s as the Pinetree network was automated. In 1967, the RCAF Station became a Canadian Forces Station as part of the tri-service unification program. By 1974, with progress and radar operations and technology, this particular site had become redundant. Operations at CFS Armstrong were terminated in April of that year and the station officially closed the following October. It was sold to a Kitchener firm in 1975 for $105,467.

Today, most of the station's buildings remain including the radar towers, but without their radomes. The station is now called D&L Estates, a village which includes a hotel, laundromat, residences and a restaurant. The Estates are described as "Your Host of the North" on a small search radar antenna by the station's entrance.

-- Paul Ozorak