Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base

For the civilian use of this facility and airport information, see Rickenbacker International Airport.

Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base is an Ohio Air National Guard installation at Rickenbacker International Airport near Lockbourne in southern Franklin County. The base was named for the famous early aviator and Columbus native Eddie Rickenbacker. It is the home of the 121st Air Refueling Wing (121 ARW), an Air National Guard (ANG) unit that serves as the host wing and operates in federal service under the United States Air Force Air Mobility Command (AMC). Rickenbacker ANGB Composite Squadron (OH-121), a Civil Air Patrol squadron, also operates on the base.

Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base
Near Columbus, Ohio in the United States
A KC-135R Stratotanker of the Ohio Air National Guard's 121st Air Refuelling Wing touches down at Rickenbacker ANGB during 2012.
Site information
Type	Air National Guard Base
Owner	Department of Defense
Operator	US Air Force (USAF)
Controlled by	Ohio Air National Guard (ANG)
Condition	Operational
Website	www.121arw.ang.af.mil
Location
Rickenbacker ANGB Location in the United States
Coordinates	39°48′49″N 082°56′48″W
Site history
Built	1940s (as Lockbourne Army Airfield)
In use	1940s – present
Garrison information
Current commander	Colonel David B. Johnson
Garrison	121st Air Refueling Wing
Airfield information
Identifiers	IATA: LCK, ICAO: KLCK, FAA LID: LCK, WMO: 724285
Elevation	226.7 metres (744 ft) AMSL
Runways Direction Length and surface 5R/23L 3,688.6 metres (12,102 ft) Asphalt/concrete 5L/23R 3,627.7 metres (11,902 ft) Asphalt
Airfield shared with Rickenbacker International Airport. Source: Federal Aviation Administration[1]

Rickenbacker ANGB operates at the airport as a tenant of the Columbus Regional Airport Authority, sharing the facility with commercial airlines and other civilian aircraft operators. The air base is a joint military facility whose own tenant activities include the Ohio Army National Guard's Army Aviation Support Facility #2, Navy Reserve and Marine Corps Reserve units, and associated facilities.

During World War II, the installation was a U.S. Army Air Forces training base known as Lockbourne Army Airfield, becoming an Air Force base in 1948 a few months following the establishment of the United States Air Force as an independent branch of the U.S. armed forces. As a Strategic Air Command (SAC) installation, in 1958 the 301st Bombardment Wing became the host wing with B-47, EB-47, RB-47 and KC-97 aircraft. In 1964, with the impending retirement of all B-47 variant aircraft and the ongoing transgfer of KC-97 aircraft to the Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard, the unit was redesignated as the 301st Air Refueling Wing with KC-135 aircraft, routinely deploying to Southeast Asia in response to the war in Vietnam.

In the mid-1970s, the base was selected for realignment as part of a post-Vietnam Reduction in Force (RIF) that inactivated a number of SAC wings and either closed the installations outright or downsized them to Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard installations. The 301st was inactivated on 30 November 1979, its KC-135 distributed to various Air National Guard units, and the base prepared for turnover to a combination of the Ohio Air National Guard and the civilian government Rickenbacker Port Authority, now the Columbus Regional Airport Authority.

The base was named Lockbourne AFB from 1948 to 1974 and later Rickenbacker AFB from 1974 to 1980. The facility was transferred from Strategic Air Command and the active duty Air Force on 1 April 1980 and turned over to the Ohio Air National Guard.