Gate 19B off National Road draws about 11,000 vehicles on a work day. It will be closed from April 3 until June 12, Wright-Patterson officials say.
Crews will install an overhead canopy, six guard booths and a upgraded barrier system to prevent traffic intruding on the base and protect sentries, said Walter Lee, a design manger at the 88th Air Base Wing Civil Engineer group at Wright-Patterson. Central NICC Joint Venture LLC, of Falls Church., Va., is the prime contractor.
“Essentially, what it’s doing is … preventing vehicles from running the gate,” Lee said.
The base, the largest single-site employer in Ohio with an estimated 27,000 military personnel and civilian employees, has had security incidents involving gates over the past year or so.
In a November 2015 security breach, a Beavercreek man drove through Gate 22B and entered an Air Force Research Laboratory building on foot, causing an hours-long employee evacuation and a shelter-in-place order at a nearby child care center.
The man pleaded guilty last month in U.S. District Court in Dayton to trespassing-related charges.
Last December, a 32-year-old Dayton man was found unresponsive near a taxiway near the main runway in Area A and later declared dead. A coroner’s report determine he apparently died of hypothermia. A base spokesman has said it appeared the man scaled a perimeter fence in a remote area near the Mad River the previous night.
On March 2 of this year, security forces shut down entrances and exits temporarily in Area A, causing a traffic backlog, after an incident at Gate 12A off Ohio 444 near Air Force Materiel Command headquarters.
An unidentified man did not show proper identification but told authorities he was there to meet someone, the base said. The driver was told to pull over to a parking lot until an escort arrived. The escort later got into the vehicle with the man, and the two drove off but did not coordinate their departure with security forces, which led to the shutdown of gates, officials have said. The man late returned to the gate and was not charged, authorities said.
In 2015, Gate 12A had a $1.3 million security upgrade that installed a pop-up barricade to stop wayward drivers, but authorities have not disclosed if the barricade went up during the incident.
The Gate 19B construction project won’t likely be the last security upgrade at Wright-Patterson.
If congressional funding is found, a new $12.6 million entryway could be built by 2019, consolidating Gates 26A off Ohio 235 near the main airfield and Gate 16A, a commercial truck inspection weigh point off Ohio 444.
Alternatives for those who regularly use Gate 19B
- Gate 16B off Kaufman Avenue near the Wright Brothers Memorial. In a rare move, the gate will be open from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. Monday through Friday for inbound traffic."It's just been open sporadically for many, many years," said Ronald Lee, a chief project manger working on the upgrade.
- Gate 1B off Springfield Street near the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force. Gate 1B will also be the only exit in Area B available for outbound traffic from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. Monday through Friday.
- Gate 22B at Interstate 675 and Col. Glenn Highway. During morning rush hour, Gate 22B will be for inbound traffic only.
Source: Wright-Patterson officials
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