Luke Air Force Base

Luke Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located seven miles (11 km) west of the central business district of Glendale, in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States. It is also about west of Phoenix, Arizona.

Luke AFB is a major training base of the Air Education and Training Command (AETC), training pilots in the F-16 Fighting Falcon. On 31 March 2011 it was announced that the F-35 Lightning II would replace the F-16 as the primary training aircraft at Luke, although the date of deployment of the new aircraft to Luke and reorganization plans were not announced.

Overview

Luke Air Force Base is the largest and only active-duty F-16 Fighting Falcon training base in the world with more than 200 F-16s assigned. The host command at Luke is the 56th Fighter Wing (56 FW), under Air Education and Training Command's 19th Air Force.

The 56th FW is composed of four groups, 27 squadrons, including six fighter squadrons. There are several tenant units on base, including the 944th Fighter Wing, assigned to 10th Air Force and the Air Force Reserve. More than 470 pilots graduate from Luke annually and proceed to combat assignments throughout the world. The 56th Fighter Wing also trains more than 700 maintenance technicians each year.

The base population includes about 7,500 military members and 15,000 family members. With about 80,000 retired military members living in greater Phoenix, the base services a total population of more than 100,000...
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