page_title: Lockheed F-94 Starfire
section_title: Air Defense Command
hierarchical_section_title: Lockheed F-94 Starfire / Operational history / Air Defense Command
caption_attribution_description: English: 27th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron Lockheed F-94C-1-LO Starfire 51-13555, Griffiss AFB, New York, 1955
context_page_description: The Lockheed F-94 Starfire was a first-generation jet aircraft of the United States Air Force. It was developed from the twin-seat Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star in the late 1940s as an all-weather, day/night interceptor. The aircraft reached operational service in May 1950 with Air Defense Command, replacing the piston-engined North American F-82 Twin Mustang in the all-weather interceptor role.
  The F-94 was the first operational USAF fighter equipped with an afterburner and was the first jet-powered all-weather fighter to enter combat during the Korean War in January 1953. It had a relatively brief operational life, being replaced in the mid-1950s by the Northrop F-89 Scorpion and North American F-86D Sabre. The last aircraft left active-duty service in 1958 and Air National Guard service in 1959.
context_section_description: The primary user of the F-94 were the squadrons of Air Defense Command (ADC), eventually equipping 26 squadrons of interceptors.  The first F-94As were assigned to the 325th Fighter-All Weather Group at McChord AFB and Moses Lake AFB, Washington.  It replaced the propeller-driven F-82F Twin Mustangs that were in use by its 317th, 318th, and 319th squadrons.  The F-82s had been pressed into interceptor service in 1949 after the Soviet Union displayed the Tupolev Tu-4 strategic bomber, a reversed-engineered version of the B-29 Superfortress, some of which had landed and were impounded in the Soviet Far East during World War II.   The F-82Fs proved to be an excellent day/night all-weather interceptor, with long range, but it lacked any logistics support which resulted in a chronic shortage of parts.   The jet-powered F-94As, however, had shorter legs than the F-82s and relied more on Ground Control Interception Radar (GCI) sites to vector them to intruding aircraft.  
  Once the 317th was equipped in the Pacific Northwest, ADC then re-equipped its 52d Fighter-All Weather Group at McGuire AFB, New Jersey which also flew F-82Fs and provided air defense of the Northeastern United States.   However, it was during this period that Air Defense Command began dispersing its Fighter-Interceptor squadrons away from their parent groups to individual bases.  During 1950 and 1951, ADC sent F-94As to squadrons of the 56th Fighter Group in the upper Midwest to replace its obsolete F-47 Thunderbolts, F-51 Mustangs, as well as F-80 Shooting Star and F-86A Sabre day jet interceptors.
  In March 1951, upgraded F-94Bs were received from Lockheed by the 33d Fighter Wing at Otis AFB, Massachusetts, replacing their F-86A Sabres, although the last squadron of the wing didn't replace its Sabres until May 1952. Three Federalized Air National Guard units, the 121st FIS (DC ANG), 142nd FIS (Maine ANG), and 148th FIS (Pennsylvania ANG), received F-94Bs while they served on active duty during the Korean War call-up to defend the airspace over Washington, D.C. However, these F-94s were retained by the USAF when these ANG squadrons returned to State control in 1952.  Also seven more squadrons received F-94Bs as part of the roll out from Lockheed.
  Three additional squadrons (84th, 436th, and 479th FIS) received F-94Bs in 1953, although these were passed down from squadrons receiving F-94Cs.  Beginning in the summer of 1951, the F-94Cs began coming off the production line, with six squadrons being equipped by May 1954.  Five more squadrons were equipped in FY 54-55 which ended the production run for the interceptor by Lockheed.
caption: 27th FIS F-94C 51-13555 at Griffiss Air Force Base, New York
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