Naval Air Station Dallas, located in Grand Prairie between Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas, operated as a Navy Reserve aviation installation from 1941 through its BRAC realignment in 1998, when reserve aviation activities were consolidated at the new Naval Air Station Fort Worth Joint Reserve Base. NAS Dallas served as a Reserve component hub for Navy, Marine Corps Reserve, and Air Force Reserve aviation in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area throughout the Cold War era.

Shore Facility Asbestos

NAS Dallas’s facilities were constructed beginning in 1941 during the wartime mobilization and expanded through the Cold War period. As a Reserve air station in active use for over five decades, the installation’s hangars, maintenance facilities, and support buildings underwent multiple renovation and maintenance cycles during the period when asbestos-containing materials were standard in military and commercial construction.

Shore facility asbestos sources at NAS Dallas included:

  • Hangars and aviation maintenance buildings constructed in the 1940s with asbestos fireproofing on structural steel and asbestos-containing roofing
  • Steam heating and utility systems serving the installation with asbestos pipe insulation and boiler lagging
  • Administrative buildings, BOQ, and enlisted barracks built with asbestos floor tile, ceiling materials, and pipe insulation through the 1970s
  • Maintenance shops where reserve aviation units maintained aircraft with asbestos gaskets and thermal insulation in ground support equipment

Reserve Aviation Operations

Navy Reserve aviation units based at NAS Dallas drilled monthly and conducted two-week active training periods in facilities with asbestos-containing building materials. Active-duty personnel assigned as the permanent full-time staff (Paid Drill, Full-Time Support) were resident in base facilities throughout their assignment period.

VA Claims for NAS Dallas Veterans

VA presumptive service connection under 38 CFR § 3.309(d) covers shore-duty asbestos exposure at Navy Reserve installations. Veterans who served at Naval Air Station Dallas in active-duty, Reserve, or Full-Time Support capacities before the installation’s 1998 realignment and have since been diagnosed with mesothelioma, asbestosis, or asbestos-related lung cancer should document their assignment through DD-214 or reserve service records listing Naval Air Station Dallas or Grand Prairie, TX.