Tonopah Test Range
37°47′N, 116°47′W
Southern Nye County, Nevada — restricted USAF/DOE test range, ~625 sq mi
[from the public record]
37.7833, -116.7833 · view on OpenStreetMap →
What's documented
The Tonopah Test Range is a restricted military test range in southern Nye County, Nevada, covering roughly 625 square miles. Operated by Sandia National Laboratories for the Department of Energy with United States Air Force support, it has been in continuous use since 1957. The range was the operational home of the F-117 stealth program from 1982 to 1992 and has hosted flight-testing of foreign-acquired Soviet aircraft (the "Constant Peg" program). The Tonopah Test Range Airport sits within the range's northern boundary.
Notable & intriguing
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The Tonopah Test Range was the operational home of the F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter from 1982 to 1992. Pilots were assigned the cover designation 4477th Test and Evaluation Squadron and flew only at night; the program was declassified in November 1988.
USAF declassification briefing, 10 Nov 1988; Crickmore, Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk, 2014.
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The “Constant Peg” program (1977–1988) operated covertly-acquired Soviet MiG-17, MiG-21 and MiG-23 aircraft from the Tonopah airfield for U.S. dissimilar air combat training. The 4477th flew approximately 15,000 sorties before the program was declassified in 2006.
Davies, Red Eagles: America’s Secret MiGs, 2008.
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The range is the principal U.S. flight-test site for nuclear-weapon delivery systems under joint Sandia / DOE authority — the “Tonopah Test Range” is a Sandia operations name; the matching USAF installation is the Tonopah Test Range Airport.
Sandia National Laboratories TTR program history.
Public-record items already documented about this subject. Folklore is labelled. Sources cited where the specificity warrants it.
Public-record imagery
