CAYCE, S.C. — McEntire Joint National Guard Base will relocate their F-16 fighter jets and some of the operations to Columbia Metropolitan Airport on a temporary basis starting next month.
Officials from the base, airport, South Carolina National Guard, and Gov. Henry McMaster announced the move Monday morning at the airport in front of a backdrop of one of the jets that will be house--for a time--at the region's chief commercial airport.
The base is moving the planes so a $20 million resurfacing project can take place on the runway and other improvements can be made. It's expected to take six months to complete and will start in April.
While that's happening, the base's F-16 jets will be relocated to the base along with some of the support operations that help them. However, other base functions, including Army operations, will remain at McEntire throughout the project.
About 250 airmen will be stationed at Columbia Metropolitan Airport, with that number climbing to 300 on drill weekends.
Military leaders say they did consider several other options, including Shaw Air Force Base and an airfield in Savannah, Georgia, but ultimately decided that Columbia Metropolitan Airport was actually the most cost-effective and could provide the best support structure. They say the Columbia selection is expected to save $500,000 over any other solution.
"Columbia is that win-win option," said Col. Quaid Quadri Jr, the commander of the 169th Fighter Wing of the South Carolina Air National Guard which calls McEntire its home. "It allows us to preserve that readiness, preserve that mission capability for our nation inside the southeast as well be able to have this this community--which is the guard---as we are by with and here for generations."
Leaders also said they worked to minimize any negative impacts of the move, including doing and environmental survey and working on plans to minimize noise.
Both Quadri and Mike Gula, the Executive Director of Columbia Metropolitan Airport, both said there would be no impact to military operation readiness nor passenger flights at the airport. However, there will be about 20 military sorties--or flight training missions--a day. "You'll see us take off 8 or 10 airplanes at a time," Quadri said.
Because it will attract some attention, the base says they're working on a temporary observation area so people can look at takeoffs and landings. People can park in the normal surface lots at Columbia Metropolitan Airport. The base said people should not park cars near Platt Springs Road, since this could be dangerous.