In a previous post, I put together lots of images of photo resolution markers, from across the USA. This post is about the four markers found at a little known airfield named Naval Outlying Field Webster in Maryland. In posts on this subject in other blogs it is often incorrectly named Walker Field, just to make things confusing. The four markers are in a straight line, with an almost exact 2000ft between them. This is likely for some sort of calibration testing, so the planes have an exact known distance to calibrate their cameras from. They are in parallel with one of the main runways to make it easy to maintain them, and as another reference for the planes.
NOLF Webster is located 12 miles south west of Naval Air Station PAX River. It was bought by the military from a set of jesuit fathers during WW2 for just $96,000. It was bought as a auxiliary airfield for PAX River, to send aircraft to on busy days. PAX River is a very famous aircraft testing base, with lots of history associated with it. Part of the history is the photoreconnaissance training school found there. That explains the reasoning for the photo resolution markers just 12 miles to the SW.
NOLF Webster is good as an air base due to it’s great location. It has a good approach by water from two sides, especially good for testing and training. The other approaches were mainly woodland and fields. The three runways are built in accordance with the prevailing winds, with two of the runways being 5,000ft long. The base was heavily used in the 1950’s as a ‘touch and go’ site for training at PAX.
In the 1960’s the former electronics test division moved in, now known as Naval Air Navigation Electronics Project (NANEP). They helped develop many air navigation systems. They stopped the interference with operations at PAX River. They may also have been a big part on the development of the photo resolution markers found there.
Most of the images I have used are taken in 2007, but the final one (of the fourth marker) is taken in 2015, where it has a slightly different pattern. This is maybe to define markers between each of them, so the planes know the final one. There don’t seem to be any other changes according to the images found on Google Earth.
Hope you enjoyed this short post, If you enjoy stories and posts on space and electronics, take a look at some of the other posts on my blog. Thank You for reading.