RAF Long Kesh

RAF Long Kesh was a Royal Air Force station at Maze, Lisburn, Northern Ireland, from 1941 until 1971.

Various aircraft operated from the base during World War II, including the Supermarine Seafire and Spitfire.

Long Kesh was a target in Operation Green (Ireland), a second front to Operation Sea Lion which was the planned Nazi invasion of the UK. Long Kesh was to be destroyed by German paratroopers while Aldergrove, Nutts Corner and Langford Lodge were to be captured.

From 1971 the then disused base became the Long Kesh Detention Centre. It was here that republicans were interned after August 9, 1971, when security forces launched dawn raids to arrest 452 known or suspected members of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). From 1976 these makeshift structures were abandoned in favour of the newly built H-Blocks in what became HM Prison Maze.

Operational units and aircraft

• No. 74 Squadron RAF(1942) - Supermarine Spitfire I
• No. 88 Squadron RAF Detachment (1941-1942) - Douglas Boston III
• No. 226 Squadron RAF Detachment (1941) - Bristol Blenheim IV
• No. 231 Squadron RAF (1941-1942) - Curtiss Tomahawk I & IIB
• No. 290 Squadron RAF (1943-1944) - Miles Martinet
• No. 422 Squadron RCAF (1942) - Consolidated Catalina IB

See also

• List of RAF stations