Carlisle residents to remember RAF base 25 years after closure

Discussing the base, former Officer Commanding Administrator Joe Taylor shared: “RAF Carlisle was opened, alongside one or two other units in the United Kingdom in 1938 and it closed on March 31, 1997. Throughout that period, it was one of the major employers in the city and at one stage there was up to over 2,500 people working there.”

After the War, the station became the home of No. 14 Maintenance Unit and occupied the various sites originally used by RAF Kingstown’s Elementary Flying Training School during World War II.

The site was usually known both locally and within the RAF by its shortened form of 14 MU. The site had also served for a short period in the 1930s as a civilian airport for Carlisle

The maintenance unit was located on the northern edge of Carlisle, close to the Asda supermarket on Chandler Way, and spread across several different sites. The smallest storage site of Harker was 0.7 km northeast of RAF Kingstown and, together with Heathlands which was 0.5 km north, was on the opposite side on the A74.

There was also the largest Rockcliffe site as well as the Cargo site located southwest of the city. The maintenance unit was used by the RAF to store and maintain various pieces of equipment ranging from aircraft engine parts to firearms, ammunition to office furniture, aircrew clothing and small hardware items.

Routine requests for items were dealt with by the (mostly civilian) warehousemen during normal working hours. At night a uniformed RAF Duty Officer dealt with urgent and essential "flash" requests from operational flying stations.

More information regarding the base is highlighted at the Solway Aviation Museum, located at the city airport.

Included at the museum are an aircraft collection based on post war British jets that entered service with the Royal Air Force during the 1950s and 60s, as well as the chance to sit in the cockpit of a Vulcan Bomber, operated by the Royal Air Force from 1956 until 1984.