DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. -- DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. – Team Dover hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new state-of-the-art aircraft hangar at Dover AFB, Delaware, April 15, 2024.
The ceremony celebrated the completion of the $45 million project and promoted Team Dover’s dedication to innovation.
“Having an additional hangar fully enclosed allows greater capability for both scheduled and unscheduled maintenance activities,” said U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Sabrina Winter, 436th Mission Generation Group deputy commander. “It will allow us to boost our capabilities in terms of the fixed rate of our aircraft.”
The new hangar is a ‘fuel cell hangar’ designed with special ventilation, state-of-the-art fire, mechanical and electrical safety measures, allowing maintainers to work on the aircraft in a safe environment.
“Quality of life for maintainers is important, and so is safety,” said Lt. Col. Jerome Rogers, 512th Maintenance commander. “This hangar adds additional comfort and flexibility to working indoors while also maximizing our time to conduct maintenance and maintenance training as a total force.”
In addition to being a ‘fuel cell hangar,’ it is also only one of three hangars on base that is fully enclosed and capable of housing the largest aircraft in the Air Force inventory, the C-5M Super Galaxy. Dover AFB is home to 18 C-5s and 13 C-17 Globemaster IIIs, the second-largest aircraft in the Air Force inventory.
“To get a new facility that our Airmen can utilize and expand their capabilities is amazing,” said Winter. “The hangar is a big, open space with a lot of potential for our Airmen to get after both the near fight and the future fight.”
This hangar is the first built on Dover AFB since 1983 and is the only hangar on the installation that will serve both the C-17 and C-5.
“This new hangar will certainly prove to be a force multiplier as we continue to navigate the strategic environment of great power competition, sustainment challenges, and the insatiable appetite for airlift capability,” said Col. Bary Flack, 436th Mission Generation Group commander.