page_title: McCoy Air Force Base
section_title: Cuban Missile Crisis
hierarchical_section_title: McCoy Air Force Base / History / Cold War / Cuban Missile Crisis
caption_attribution_description: English: F-100F of the 353d Tactical Fighter Squadron - 354th Tactical Fighter Wing, Myrtle Beach Air Force Base, SC - Wing Commander.
context_page_description: McCoy AFB is a former U.S. Air Force installation located 10 miles southeast of Orlando, Florida. It was a training base during World War II. From 1951 to 1975, it was a front line Strategic Air Command base during the Cold War and Vietnam War. It was Orlando's biggest employer and economic backbone prior to the opening of Walt Disney World in 1971.
  With McCoy's closure as an active USAF facility in 1975, the site was redeveloped and is known today as Orlando International Airport, which continues to carry the base's original FAA LID airport code of MCO and ICAO airport code of KMCO.
  Over the course of its existence the installation had several names, including Orlando Army Air Field #2, Pinecastle Army Airfield, and Pinecastle Air Force Base.
context_section_description: On 14 October 1962, a Lockheed U-2 from the 4080th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing at Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas piloted by Major Richard S. Heyser, USAF, launched from Edwards AFB, California for a high altitude reconnaissance flight over Cuba. Arriving over the island an hour after sunrise, Heyser photographed the Soviet military installing nuclear armed SS-4 medium range and SS-5 intermediate range ballistic missiles in Cuba, thereby precipitating the Cuban Missile Crisis.
  Heyser concluded this flight at McCoy AFB and the 4080th subsequently established a U-2 operating location at McCoy AFB, launching and recovering numerous flights over Cuba for the duration of the crisis. On 21 October, Attorney General of the United States Robert F. Kennedy; United States Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara; Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Maxwell Taylor, USA; and General Walter C. Sweeney, Jr., USAF met with President John F. Kennedy concerning a military contingency plan regarding this development.  The 4080th's operating location at McCoy AFB, designated OL-X, operated two U-2 aircraft and flew at least 82 missions over Cuba from McCoy AFB from 22 October – 6 December 1962.
  General Sweeney, as Commander of Tactical Air Command (TAC), proposed an operational plan which first called for an air attack on the surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites in the vicinity of known medium range (MRBM) and intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) launchers by eight fighter-bombers per SAM site. Concurrently, each of the Cuban MiG airfields thought to be protecting MRBM/IRBM sites were to be struck by at least twelve fighters. Following the air strikes on SAM sites and MiG fighter airfields, each MRBM and IRBM launch site was to be attacked by at least twelve aircraft. General Sweeney's plan was accepted and, additionally, Cuban Ilyushin Il-28 "Beagle" medium bomber airfields were added to the target list.
  To support this plan, the USAF deployed the following TAC units to McCoy AFB while simultaneously dispersing the 4047th Strategic Wing's B-52 and KC-135 aircraft:
  4th Tactical Fighter Wing:  67 F-105Bs
  (Deployed from Seymour Johnson AFB, North Carolina)
  354th Tactical Fighter Wing:  63 F-100D/Fs
  (Deployed from Myrtle Beach AFB, South Carolina)
  427th Air Refueling Squadron:  20 KB-50Js
  (Deployed from Langley AFB, Virginia)
  On the morning of 27 October, a U-2 piloted by Major Rudolf Anderson, Jr., USAF, departed McCoy AFB on yet another Cuban overflight mission. A few hours into his mission, Anderson's aircraft was engaged by a Soviet-manned SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air missile site in the vicinity of Banes, Cuba.  Hit by two of three SA-2 missiles fired, the aircraft was shot down over Cuba, killing Major Anderson.
  A week following the shoot down, Major Anderson's remains were turned over to a United Nations representative and returned to the United States. Major Anderson became the first recipient of the Air Force Cross, the U.S. Air Force's second highest decoration for valor after the Medal of Honor, which was awarded to him posthumously.
  The Cuban missile confrontation was ultimately resolved and the air strikes, which would have been followed by an invasion of Cuba, were never launched.  However, all of the aforementioned squadrons and detachments except one remained at McCoy until the end of November 1962.  The 4080th at Laughlin AFB and its successor unit, the 100th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing at Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona, would continue to maintain a permanent operating location at McCoy AFB for U-2 detachment operations monitoring Cuba through 1973, when it relocated to nearby Patrick AFB.  In later years, these operations would occasionally be augmented by SR-71 detachments from the 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing at Beale AFB, California.
caption: F-100, AF Ser. No. 56-3869, of the 354 TFW at McCoy AFB, October 1962
exif: {}