History:
RAF Upwood was a non-flying station which was under the control of the United States Air Force from 1981, and one of three RAF stations in Cambridgeshire used by the United States Air Forces in Europe.
A few huts and aeroplane sheds were erected, only to be quickly removed when the RAF left the site in 1919. Though the location wasn’t forgotten and it was converted into a permanent RAF station in 1935-36. It was at the time when the building where being put up that the station was renamed Upwood.
During WW1 in September of that year the station opened as Bury. This initial name referred to its location near the village of Bury and the larger market town of Ramsey. Initially there were no permanent flying units assigned to the station. Instead, No. 75 Squadron flying BE.2 aircraft out of Elmswell, Suffolk used the station as a night-landing ground and satellite field.
During WW2, as part of the RAF expansion programme, this airfield was in dire need of revamping, the grass-surfaced and had some 250 acres. A camp of permanent buildings where built in the south-west corner adjacent to the village of Bury. They consisted of the steel and brick flat-roofed buildings that were the hallmark of these expansion period stations. The first flying unit to use the new runways at Upwood was No 139 Squadron flying Mosquitos. The following month No. 156 Squadron joined them from Warboys to give Upwood an operational Lancaster unit and these two squadrons remained in residence for the rest of hostilities. Operational losses from Upwood totalled 66, half being Lancaster’s and half Mosquitos.
It was closed off in 1994 by the Ministry of Defence and and the land and buildings got sold off to civil ownership. The site of the medical wing has been cleared over the period of September/October 2015 to make way for private housing.
The future for this site is to demolish the whole site and build new housing. Articles dating from March 2017 talked about "later in the year.”... 2 years on and housing development has started!
Explore:
The other day me and @oleo.21 took a trip up to RAF Upwood as we had basically been meaning to go here for a very long time and to kind of tick it off our list really. I’ve been seeing so much of this place recently all over Instagram and Facebook pages, and I was devastated to read comments of rumours stating that the site had been demolished or was in the process of getting knocked down. Now I can put a few rumours to rest and confirm with you guys with honest truth from my own eyes that as a matter fact, yes builders are on the site and a lot of the buildings have now been fenced off however a lot of the fences have been trampled down and you can still access everything. On the plus side the builders really didn’t care at all that we was running in and out of the buildings. When walking up to the site we noticed a lot of builders in big lorries driving past us and we noticed some new houses right next to the RAF site. We was very glad to see when we walked further down we could see a clearly derelict building to do with the site. We did as a matter of fact explore first the “Upwood Hill House”, that’s a separate report I made:
https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/upwood-hill-house-cambridgeshire-september-2019.119927/
Now for the site there really isn’t much to say other than going on the roofs of each of the buildings was the most exciting as the insides of the buildings were very much the same and quite boring after a while of seeing all of the buildings. I had more fun walking through the buildings and not really taking pictures as everything looked the same and I just struggled on getting different photographs. It’s basically just a massive ruin but an interesting place to have a mooch around. The best parts of the interiors to all of the buildings would have to be the staircases and the graffiti. The graffiti actually makes this place somewhat worth going to as there is some interesting pieces on the wall. It was nice to have a walk around the site. It just felt like a ghost town! On to the pictures!
RAF Upwood was a non-flying station which was under the control of the United States Air Force from 1981, and one of three RAF stations in Cambridgeshire used by the United States Air Forces in Europe.
A few huts and aeroplane sheds were erected, only to be quickly removed when the RAF left the site in 1919. Though the location wasn’t forgotten and it was converted into a permanent RAF station in 1935-36. It was at the time when the building where being put up that the station was renamed Upwood.
During WW1 in September of that year the station opened as Bury. This initial name referred to its location near the village of Bury and the larger market town of Ramsey. Initially there were no permanent flying units assigned to the station. Instead, No. 75 Squadron flying BE.2 aircraft out of Elmswell, Suffolk used the station as a night-landing ground and satellite field.
During WW2, as part of the RAF expansion programme, this airfield was in dire need of revamping, the grass-surfaced and had some 250 acres. A camp of permanent buildings where built in the south-west corner adjacent to the village of Bury. They consisted of the steel and brick flat-roofed buildings that were the hallmark of these expansion period stations. The first flying unit to use the new runways at Upwood was No 139 Squadron flying Mosquitos. The following month No. 156 Squadron joined them from Warboys to give Upwood an operational Lancaster unit and these two squadrons remained in residence for the rest of hostilities. Operational losses from Upwood totalled 66, half being Lancaster’s and half Mosquitos.
It was closed off in 1994 by the Ministry of Defence and and the land and buildings got sold off to civil ownership. The site of the medical wing has been cleared over the period of September/October 2015 to make way for private housing.
The future for this site is to demolish the whole site and build new housing. Articles dating from March 2017 talked about "later in the year.”... 2 years on and housing development has started!
Explore:
The other day me and @oleo.21 took a trip up to RAF Upwood as we had basically been meaning to go here for a very long time and to kind of tick it off our list really. I’ve been seeing so much of this place recently all over Instagram and Facebook pages, and I was devastated to read comments of rumours stating that the site had been demolished or was in the process of getting knocked down. Now I can put a few rumours to rest and confirm with you guys with honest truth from my own eyes that as a matter fact, yes builders are on the site and a lot of the buildings have now been fenced off however a lot of the fences have been trampled down and you can still access everything. On the plus side the builders really didn’t care at all that we was running in and out of the buildings. When walking up to the site we noticed a lot of builders in big lorries driving past us and we noticed some new houses right next to the RAF site. We was very glad to see when we walked further down we could see a clearly derelict building to do with the site. We did as a matter of fact explore first the “Upwood Hill House”, that’s a separate report I made:
https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/upwood-hill-house-cambridgeshire-september-2019.119927/
Now for the site there really isn’t much to say other than going on the roofs of each of the buildings was the most exciting as the insides of the buildings were very much the same and quite boring after a while of seeing all of the buildings. I had more fun walking through the buildings and not really taking pictures as everything looked the same and I just struggled on getting different photographs. It’s basically just a massive ruin but an interesting place to have a mooch around. The best parts of the interiors to all of the buildings would have to be the staircases and the graffiti. The graffiti actually makes this place somewhat worth going to as there is some interesting pieces on the wall. It was nice to have a walk around the site. It just felt like a ghost town! On to the pictures!
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