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Kenitra Airport
Kenitra Airport; [كنيترا] مطار
IATA: NNA – ICAO: GMMY
Summary
Airport type	Civilian
Serves	Kenitra, Morocco
Elevation AMSL	16 ft / 5 m
Coordinates	34°17′56.10″N 6°35′45.84″W / 34.298917°N 6.5960667°W
Runways

Kenitra Airport (Arabic: [كنيترا] مطار) (IATA: NNA, ICAO: GMMY) is an airport serving the city of Kenitra in Morocco.

[edit] History

Kenitra Airport was previously known as Craw Field, named for Medal of Honor recipient Colonel Demas T. Craw who was killed while attempting to deliver a message from American General Lucian Truscott to the Vichy French Commander at Port Lyautey requesting that the French surrender. Although imprisoned, Craw's interpreter, Major Pierpont Hamilton, a descendant of Alexander Hamilton, negotiated the French surrender during Operation Torch and the airport was eventually secured for the Allied forces. Pierpont Hamilton also received the Medal of Honor for his actions.

The air base at Port Lyautey served as a staging area for many Allied operations in North Africa and the Mediterranean Theater of Operations (MTO) during WWII. The United States Navy (USN) Fleet Air Wing 15 and the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) 480th Antisubmarine Group were based there with specialized aircraft including PBY Catalinas, B-24 Liberators, and Goodyear-built K-ships (blimps) used to search for German U-Boats in the Atlantic Ocean and especially in the shallow waters of the Straits of Gibraltar where radar and magnetic anomaly detection were viable.

Craw Field was the final destination of the six K-ships of USN Blimp Squadron ZP-14 (Blimpron 14, the Africa Squadron) that made the first transatlantic crossing of non-rigid airships in 1944.^[1]

It was used by the United States Navy as "Naval Training Center Kenitra" until the early 1970's. The Moroccan Air Force was trained by U.S. pilots on how to fly fighter jets. It was a secret U.S. Naval Station. An indiscriminate Senator, in Washington D.C., divulged its existence in 1972. The reigning King of Morocco was then forced, by surrounding Islamic Nations, to remove the American Base.