RAF Ringstead
Former military radar site in Dorset, England
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
RAF Ringstead is a former Royal Air Force radar station at Ringstead Bay, Dorset, England. It is notable for having served three separate functions: first as a Chain Home early-warning radar station during WWII and then, during the Cold War, as a Rotor station and then, finally, as a USAF Tropospheric scatter station. The first of these functions commenced in 1942; the last of the functions ceased in 1974. The structural remains were Grade II listed in 2020.[1]
RAF Ringstead  | |
|---|---|
| Ringstead Bay, Dorset in England | |
 One of the former transmitter blocks of RAF Ringstead in 2011 | |
| Site information | |
| Type | Royal Air Force Station |
| Owner | Ministry of Defence |
| Operator | Royal Air Force United States Air Force |
| Location | |
  RAF Ringstead Shown within Dorset  RAF Ringstead RAF Ringstead (the United Kingdom) | |
| Coordinates | 50°38′03″N 002°20′35″W |
| Site history | |
| Built | 1941 |
| In use | 1942 - 1946 |
| Battles/wars | European theatre of World War II Cold War |
Chain Home
Chain Home was a ring of early warning radar stations built around the coastline as part of WWII defences from the late 1930s onwards.[1]
RAF Ringstead Chain Home Radar Station (known as AMES12B and CH12B) was built in 1941, and was fully operational by March 1942.[1] It was designed with well-dispersed structures: doubled-up transmitter and receiver blocks, a substation and a standby set house in earth-bound bunkers, four 325ft steel transmitter aerial masts and two 240ft self-supporting timber receiver aerial towers.[1] Ringstead Chain Home was stood down in 1945.[1]
Rotor station
In 1952, the former Chain Home station was refurbished into a Rotor station site (known as SRD).[1] The Rotor programme was developed to update previous wartime radar technology and to install more capable radar systems to detect and locate fast-flying jets.[1] The former Chain Home station became the technical site of the Rotor station; Upton Farm, 2 km to the north, became the domestic site, where personnel were accommodated.[1] It closed in 1956.[1]
Tropospheric scatter
In 1963, a United States Air Force Tropospheric scatter station was established at Ringstead to provide a cross-channel relay link from High Wycombe Atomic Joint Co-Ordination Centre to a counterpart network in Gorramendi, near Elizondo, in the Spanish Pyrenees.[1][2] Two parabolic aerials were erected as part of this refurbishment.[1] The Tropospheric Scatter station was operated by USAF No 6 Detachment, 2180 Communications Squadron,[3] and closed in 1974.[1]
Legacy
The Tropospheric Scatter station parabolic aerials were dismantled in 1975.[3] The Wessex Hang Gliding Club use the field where the aerials were formerly located for emergency landings.[4]
The bunker is on land owned by the National Trust, and the Trust occasionally run open days.[5]
The radar station was listed Grade II in 2020, as one of the best-preserved Chain Home stations in southwest England, and as such a rare example of its type.[1] One of the two transmitting blocks is proposed for conversion to holiday accommodation.[1] Planning permission was granted in 2021 for a conversion designed by Lipton Plant Architects.[6]