Drafted — not technically validated
Record revision 1 · Israel's northernmost fighter base: RAF Ramat David from 1942, the first jet squadron, Osirak, and every F-16C/D Barak since 2021.
A real-world airfield as described in public sources, and how sim maps represent it. Units, facilities and names change; each is dated where the sources allow, and the charts are not for navigation. Use current official publications for flight planning.
Location and identity
- Location
- 20 km south-east of Haifa in the Jezreel Valley, Northern District of Israel, beside kibbutz Ramat David [1]
- Country or territory
- Israel
- Coordinates
- 32.6651° N, 35.1795° E [2]
- Identifiers
- ICAO LLRD
- Other names
- RAF Ramat David (former name, 1942–1948) [1]
- Opened
- as RAF Ramat David, a Royal Air Force airfield under the British Mandate, after a rolled-earth emergency strip had been used there in 1941 [1]
- Theatre
- Middle East
Role and operators
- Status
- Active · Military
- Roles today
- Fighter and strike · Reconnaissance and surveillance
Units
Permanently based units belong to the airfield; rotational and temporarily deployed units are there for a period or an operation. Dates are when the sources place each unit there; "as of" is when a source described it as current.
Current
101 Squadron "First Fighter" [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- F-16C Barak
- When
- since 2021; as of Oct 2026
105 Squadron "Scorpion" [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- F-16D Barak
- When
- since 2021; as of Oct 2026
109 Squadron "The Valley" [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- Mystère IVA, A-4 Skyhawk, Kfir C.7, F-16D Barak
- When
- since 1956; as of Oct 2026
157 Squadron "In The Valley", electronic warfare [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- classified UAVs
- When
- as of Oct 2026
160 Squadron "Shadow Hunter", reopened 2018 [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- classified UAVs
- When
- since 2018; as of Oct 2026
Earlier
117 Squadron "First Jet", the air force's first jet squadron [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- Meteor F.8, Mirage IIICJ, F-16A/B Netz, F-16C/D Barak
- When
- Jun 1953 – Oct 2020
110 Squadron "Knights Of The North" [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- Vautour II, Meteor F.8, A-4 Skyhawk, F-16A/B Netz, F-16C/D Barak
- When
- 1957–2017
193 Squadron "Defenders Of The West", maritime helicopters for the navy's corvettes [1]
- Service
- Israel, air force
- Basing
- Permanently based
- Aircraft
- AS565 Panther (Atalef)
- When
- 1996 – 31 Aug 2025
Runways and facilities
The sources do not date these figures. Facilities not listed here are not documented in the sources cited, which does not mean the airfield lacks them.
| Runway | Length | Width | Surface |
|---|---|---|---|
| 09/27 [1] [2]2,606 m | 8,550 ft (2,606 m) | 145 ft (44 m) | asphalt |
| 11/29 [1] [2]2,431 m | 7,975 ft (2,431 m) | 115 ft (35 m) | asphalt |
| 15/33 [1] [2]2,406 m | 7,895 ft (2,406 m) | 150 ft (46 m) | asphalt |
- Arresting gear
- None documented in the sources cited
- Navaids
- None documented in the sources cited
Figure 1 — Airfield map of Ramat David Airbase (to scale)
- Runway
- Taxiway
- Apron
- Hangar or terminal
- Helipad
- Airfield boundary
Runways, taxiways, aprons and buildings inside the airfield boundary, true north up, drawn from OpenStreetMap data retrieved 2026-10-28. Widths come from the map data or, where it gives none, a typical 45 m runway and 18 m taxiway. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the ODbL 1.0. Community-mapped, not an official aerodrome chart, and not for navigation.
Sim maps
Represented in: DCS: Syria, DCS: Sinai, Falcon BMS: Israel
DCS: Syria DCS World · Present day
Represented as “Ramat David” · checked 2026-10-28 [3]
DCS: Sinai DCS World · Present day
Represented as “Ramat David” · checked 2026-10-28 [4]
Falcon BMS: Israel Falcon BMS · Present day
Represented as “Ramat David” · checked 2026-10-28 [5]
- Its hardened aircraft shelters were given improved models in the theatre's version 1.08.1 [5]
Only the maps marked represented or confirmed absent have been checked. Any other map may or may not represent this airfield.
Other maps in Middle East, not yet checked for this airfield, which may lie outside them: DCS: Persian Gulf, DCS: Iraq, DCS: Iraq North.
Role today
Ramat David is the Israeli Air Force’s northernmost base with fighters and UAVs, 20 km south-east of Haifa in the Jezreel Valley. [1] Since 2021 it has held all of the air force’s remaining F-16C/D Barak squadrons: 101 and 105 Squadrons moved in from Hatzor to join 109 Squadron, which has been there since 1956. [1] Two squadrons of classified UAVs, 157 and 160, are also based there. [1]
Syria and Lebanon are only 50 to 60 km away, and the fighters live in underground hangars and shelters with several entrances, which they taxi into after each landing. [1] Hezbollah fired rockets at the base on 22 August and 22 September 2024 with no serious hit reported, and an Iron Dome battery is stationed there. [1] In the Iran war of June 2026 the IDF confirmed a missile hit on the base, which damaged a hangar reportedly used for vehicle maintenance. [1]
The base may not stay military. In February 2026 the Israeli government approved building international airports at Ramat David and at Ziklag near Beersheba, and the closure of 193 Squadron in August 2025 has been read as a sign that the air force is preparing to leave. [1]
History
Roald Dahl landed his RAF Hurricane on a strip of rolled earth in a sweet-corn field here in June 1941, an emergency field in case RAF Haifa was bombed. [1] The RAF made it a proper airfield, RAF Ramat David, in 1942, and fighter, bomber and transport squadrons took turns there until 1948; Jewish paratroopers also trained there during the war to drop behind German lines. [1] On 22 May 1948, a week after Israel declared independence, the Royal Egyptian Air Force attacked the still-British base in the belief that Israel held it, destroying aircraft and a hangar and killing four British airmen; five of the Egyptian fighters were shot down. [1] The Israel Defense Forces took it over shortly after. [1]
It grew into the main base for Israeli air operations north into Syria and Lebanon. [1] 117 Squadron formed there on 17 June 1953 as the air force’s first jet squadron, with Meteors, and flew Mirage IIICJs in the Six-Day, Attrition and Yom Kippur wars. [1] In 1980 it and 110 Squadron received Israel’s first F-16A/Bs, and four of 117 Squadron’s jets flew in Operation Opera, the destruction of Iraq’s Osirak reactor, in June 1981. [1] In the 1973 war it was the only Israeli air base where rockets hit and caused casualties. [1] 110 Squadron closed in 2017 and 117 Squadron in October 2020, reopening on F-35Is at Nevatim in 2021. [1]
The airfield
Three asphalt runways in a triangle, each about 2.4 to 2.6 km long, and a heliport. [1] [2]
Sources
- Ramat David Airbase. Wikipedia (secondary source). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramat_David_Airbase (accessed 2026-10-28). History, the RAF units, the squadrons since 1948 and the 2026 airport decision.
- Airport and runway data, LLRD. OurAirports open data (public domain, community-maintained). https://davidmegginson.github.io/ourairports-data/airports.csv (accessed 2026-10-28). Rows for LLRD in airports.csv and runways.csv: position, elevation and the three runways.
- dcs-world-schema reference data: Syria airbases (Ramat David.json). dcs-world-schema, open-source data extracted by running DCS World 2.9.30.28536. https://github.com/YoloWingPixie/dcs-world-schema/blob/c3091e6c08fb8167e26145d0e33c10e4140c6fe7/dcs-world-reference/latest/airbases/Syria/Ramat%20David.json (accessed 2026-10-28). With its beacon and navaid files, as tabled on the DCS: Syria map page.
- dcs-world-schema reference data: Sinai airbases (Ramat David.json). dcs-world-schema, open-source data extracted by running DCS World 2.9.30.28536. https://github.com/YoloWingPixie/dcs-world-schema/blob/c3091e6c08fb8167e26145d0e33c10e4140c6fe7/dcs-world-reference/latest/airbases/SinaiMap/Ramat%20David.json (accessed 2026-10-28). With its beacon and navaid files, as tabled on the DCS: Sinai map page.
- Israel Theater Of Operations v1.08.1.1. Falcon BMS forum (release announcement). https://forum.falcon-bms.com/topic/30861 (accessed 2026-10-28).
Wikipedia articles are secondary sources and can change; they are cited with the date they were read. FAA airport data and diagrams are official but are reissued every 28 or 56 days; each is cited with the edition read. pydcs mirrors the DCS terrain data at the commit linked.