Beauvechain’s first airfield was a grass strip at Les Burettes, laid out in 1935 according to La DH; a second, Le Culot, followed in 1936 on the site of today’s base. In the run-up to war it served as an auxiliary field for the Aviation Militaire, a dispersal ground rather than a main base. The squadrons that mattered in May 1940 were at Schaffen, near Diest: the Gladiators of 1/I/2, the “Comet” escadrille under Captain Guisgand, and the Hurricanes of 2/I/2 under Captain Marcel Charlier.

The Luftwaffe hit Schaffen in the first hours of 10 May 1940. Of the 11 operational Hurricanes only three escaped destruction. Guisgand got all but two of his 14 serviceable Gladiators off minutes before the bombs fell and led them to Les Burettes/Le Culot. On 11 May the Gladiators flew escort for Belgian bombers and met superior German fighters: four were lost, and Sergeants Pirlot and Clinquart were killed.

The same afternoon, at 16.30, twelve Messerschmitt Bf 109s of I./JG 1 swept over Le Culot. Belgian Wings records the three surviving Hurricanes, H-23, H-29 and H-34, as destroyed there, with Gladiators G-18, G-31, G-32 and G-38 destroyed and four more probably destroyed. The summary on English Wikipedia that the Germans “captured” the field on 10 May does not fit this record: Belgian aircraft were still flying from it on 11 May, and the date the Germans occupied it is not confirmed in the sources used here.

Le Culot became a major German airfield. By the English Wikipedia account, bombers of Kampfgeschwader 3 flew from it in support of the breakthrough at Sedan and stayed through the Battle of Britain; the Wikipedia article on KG 3 records that its staff flight moved to Le Culot with seven aircraft, three of them serviceable, as the Luftwaffe prepared for the attack on England. The sources disagree on the type: the base article says Junkers Ju 88, while the KG 3 article says the wing flew the Dornier Do 17 throughout 1940.

KG 3 left for Poland in March 1941 ahead of the invasion of the Soviet Union. The Germans then turned the grass field into a proper base with concrete runways, taxiways, revetments and workshops. Long-range reconnaissance Ju 88s flew from it over the North Sea and Atlantic between December 1941 and May 1942, and Vintage Aviation News adds that Italian air force units used the field in late 1940.

From November 1943 bombers returned for Operation Steinbock, the night offensive against southern England between January and May 1944; Wikipedia names elements of KG 6, LG 1 and KG 30 as operating from Le Culot until July 1944. That made the field a target. It was attacked repeatedly by B-26 Marauders of the US Ninth Air Force and swept by P-47s, and B-17 heavy bombers struck it in early 1944, causing severe damage to the airfield and station.

After the liberation the 846th Engineer Aviation Regiment of IX Engineer Command repaired the wrecked field, and it reopened on 28 October 1944 as Advanced Landing Ground A-89. The dates do not quite agree: the 373rd Fighter Group’s station list puts it at Le Culot from 22 October 1944, six days earlier. Its P-47 Thunderbolts were there when the Germans attacked in the Ardennes and flew close support once the weather cleared on 24 December.

The 36th Fighter Group, also on P-47s, was based at A-89 from 27 October 1944 to 26 March 1945, and the B-26 Marauders of the 322nd Bombardment Group from March to June 1945. The field then served the Ninth Air Force as a supply and distribution base, according to the French Wikipedia, before it was formally handed back to Belgium in December 1946.

The Belgians did not wait for the paperwork. On 24 October 1946, 24 Spitfires carrying the colours of 349 and 350 Squadrons landed at the base. Both had been RAF squadrons manned by Belgians: 350 formed at RAF Valley in November 1941 and 349 at Ikeja in Nigeria on 10 November 1942. Their transfer to the Belgian air force is dated 24 October 1946 for 349 and 15 October 1946 for 350. The war had left Beauvechain almost completely destroyed, and it was rebuilt around them.

The 1st Fighter Wing was formally created at Beauvechain on 1 February 1948. English Wikipedia says it had four squadrons; 349 and 350 are the constant, and 11 Squadron flew with the wing in the CF-100 years. Jets came fast. Belgium ordered 48 Meteor F.4s on 12 March 1949, delivered to the 1st Wing between April and September that year; the F.8 followed from early 1951, and at the end of 1951 the wing formed a stunt team later known as the Acrobobs.

The 1950s were restless. Hunter F.4s reached 349 and 350 Squadrons in 1957, but a year later the wing was switched to night and all-weather interception, and a flypast of 12 Hunters on 30 April 1958 marked the end of that short era. Belgium bought 54 Avro Canada CF-100 Mk 5 Canucks for 42 million dollars, paid 75 per cent by the United States and 25 per cent by Canada; 53 were delivered, the first 15 ferried in December 1957. They served 11, 349 and 350 Squadrons of the 1st All Weather Wing until 1964.

The F-104G Starfighter replaced them: 350 Squadron from April 1963 and 349 from October 1963, with the type operational in the all-weather role in August 1964. From 1957 to 1996 Beauvechain held a NATO 24-hour alert section, later part of the Interceptor Alert Force. In 1955 the base was named after Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Roman, a chief of corps who died on flying duty, according to the French Wikipedia; the AIP still lists it as Base Lt Col Avi Ch. Roman.

Belgium signed for the F-16 on 9 June 1975, the European “contract of the century” shared with Denmark, the Netherlands and Norway; the firm contract for 116 aircraft, 96 single-seat F-16As and 20 two-seat F-16Bs, followed on 5 May 1977. The first to be equipped was the 1st Fighter Wing. English Wikipedia says the first F-16 arrived in January 1979; Belgian Wings lists FA-01 as delivered in March 1979.

349 Squadron was the first to give up its Starfighters, and it is described as the first operational F-16 squadron in NATO. Four F-16As took over the Beauvechain alert from the F-104G in September 1980, and the last 350 Squadron Starfighters were flown to storage at Koksijde on 14 April 1981. For the next fifteen years the wing flew the air-defence F-16 mission, and an F-16 in the colours of 350 Squadron’s 45th anniversary is preserved on the base.

The end came with the post-Cold War cuts. In March 1996, on 4 March according to English Wikipedia, the 1st Fighter Wing was disbanded: 349 Squadron and the F-16 Operational Conversion Unit went to Kleine-Brogel and 350 Squadron to Florennes, where both still fly. Beauvechain’s fifty years as a fighter base were over, and its memory passed to a volunteer museum, the First Wing Historical Centre, which La DH dates to 1996 and Vintage Aviation News to February 1998.

On 12 September 1996 all Belgian flying training units were consolidated at Beauvechain as the 1st Training Wing, ending 75 years of flying at Goetsenhoven; units from Brustem also moved in. Basic training is flown on the SIAI-Marchetti SF.260: 36 SF.260Ms were ordered on 24 January 1969 and nine SF.260Ds in October 1991. The AIP notes that the shorter runway, 04R/22L, is mainly used by SF.260s, and the aircraft also fly with the display team that has flown as the Red Devils, in matching red paint, since the 2011 season.

In September 2010 the wing changed character. The Wing Heli at Bierset was closed and its Agusta A109s moved in: RTBF reported on 14 September 2010 that about 20 of 27 A109s had already arrived, with some 200 personnel, under Colonel Robert Breckx. Belgium had ordered 46 A109BAs on 8 December 1988, a contract later at the centre of the Agusta bribery scandal. Four NH90 TTH transport helicopters followed from 2 October 2013.

Both fleets are now being replaced. The NH90 TTH, whose availability at times fell below 40 per cent, was withdrawn in 2025. The H145M was unveiled at Beauvechain on 23 June 2026, 15 for Defence and five for the Federal Police by 2027, to replace the A109. Eighteen Pilatus PC-7 MKX trainers are to take over basic training from 2028 under a 20-year service contract of about 40 million euros a year, the SF.260 retiring in 2027. The helicopter squadrons’ current numbers are not confirmed by an official source used here.