El Daba is a village and rail station about 180 km West of Alexandria by road. RAF El Daba (otherwise Desert Landing Ground 105) is a former Royal Air Force military airfield located approximately 4.6 kilometres south-southeast of the village. El Daba was a pre–World War II airfield, one of a number of DLGs created in the Western Desert of Egypt after the Munich Crisis of the late 1930s. During World War II, it was used as a military airfield by the British Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces during the North African campaign against Axis forces, and by the Luftwaffe.

RAF El Daba
Landing Ground 105
Coordinates30°59′59″N 028°27′59″E / 30.99972°N 28.46639°E / 30.99972; 28.46639
Site history
Built1939
In use1939-1943
RAF El Daba is located in Egypt
RAF El Daba
RAF El Daba
Location of RAF El Daba

Royal Air Force Squadrons which used the airfield between 1939 and 1943 were No's 30, 33, 45, 73, 74 113, 211.

USAAF Ninth Air Force units which used the airfield were:

After the war, El Daba appears to have been closed about 1946. Today, the area is heavily used by agriculture. There is no evidence of the airfield's existence.

British Coordinates

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See also

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References

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  This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency

  • Maurer, Maurer. Air Force Combat Units of World War II. Maxwell AFB, Alabama: Office of Air Force History, 1983. ISBN 0-89201-092-4.
  • Maurer, Maurer, ed. (1982) [1969]. Combat Squadrons of the Air Force, World War II (PDF) (reprint ed.). Washington, DC: Office of Air Force History. ISBN 0-405-12194-6. LCCN 70605402. OCLC 72556.
  • Wisdom TH. Wings Over Olympus London, George Allen & Unwin 1942
  • Royal Air Force Airfield Creation for the Western Desert Campaign
  • 1:250,000 Egypt and Cyrenaica Sheet 14 El Daba 1942 (MLRS Map Reprints)