page_title: Williams Air Force Base
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: Williams Air Force Base / History / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: Williams Army Airfield - Main Gate 1942
context_page_description: Williams Air Force Base is a former United States Air Force base, located in Maricopa County, Arizona east of Chandler, and about 30 miles southeast of Phoenix. It is a designated Superfund site due to a number of soil and groundwater contaminants.
  It was active as a training base for both the United States Army Air Force, as well as the USAF from 1941 until its closure in 1993. Williams was the leading pilot training facility of the USAF, supplying 25% of all pilots.
  Since its closure, the base has largely been annexed by the city of Mesa, Arizona. It was converted into the civilian Williams Gateway Airport, later renamed Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport. In recent years, the land has emerged as an educational and industrial campus anchored by Arizona State University Polytechnic Campus and Chandler-Gilbert Community College.
context_section_description: During World War II, Williams Field was under the command of the 89th Army Air Force Base Unit, AAF West Coast Training Center. The flying organization was the 38th (Bombardier and Specialized Twin- and 4-Engine) Flying Training Wing. Thousands of future P-38 Lightning pilots learnt their twin-engine flying skills flying the Beech AT-10 Wichita at Williams.   By July 1942, there were 79 AT-10s assigned to the field, however the hot, dry climate of Arizona tended to dry out the wood and glue of the wooden AT-10s, causing at least 10 flying cadets to lose their lives in crashes. Training with the AT-10 was stopped and the aircraft were flown to more humid locations. They were replaced by the Cessna AT-17 Bobcat twin engine trainers, however the AT-17 was seen as "too easy to fly" and were replaced by the more demanding Curtiss-Wright AT-9.   By January 1943, almost 200 AT-9s were at the airfield.
  The RP-322 training version of the P-38 began to arrive also in early 1944, and by May, the flying school was involved in four courses of instruction. By far, the largest course was a single-engine advanced course where cadets received instruction on the AT-6 Texan. Graduates advanced to the twin-engine AT-9, then on to the RP-322. This training was intended to prepare pilots for photo-reconnaissance missions. Another course was given to experienced pilots who were transitioning to twin-engine aircraft, also in the RP-322. Later, a night fighter training program was established for pilots on the RP-322 for later transition to the P-61 Black Widow at Hammer Field, California.
  By late 1944, there was an ample supply of twin-engine pilots in training and by late 1944, the single-engine T-6 training was discontinued. Williams then began to offer four-engine training with Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers in December. Its students would be experienced pilots who were transitioning to the large four-engine bomber. The B-17 pilot training ended in April 1945, graduating 608 officers for the Flying Fortress program.
  The training mission of the base also conducted flexible gunnery training, and radar observer training.
  After the United States entered the war, the Army Air Forces also developed a pilot training program for the Chinese Air Force. The Air Corps conducted most of the training for the Chinese at Luke, Williams, and Thunderbird Fields in Arizona. Training the Chinese presented some special challenges because, due to their small stature, some students could not reach all the controls. That problem was usually solved through the use of extra cushions and occasionally by switching them to another type of airplane. A bigger problem was the language barrier. It took all the interpreters the Air Force could muster to support the training programs for the Chinese. In the end, 3,553 Chinese received flying and technical training, including 866 pilots.
caption: Williams Army Airfield - Main Gate 1942
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