Yuma Proving Ground

The presence of the U.S. Army in Yuma goes back to 1850, when Fort Yuma was constructed on a hill overlooking the important Yuma crossing of the Colorado River. Soldiers at Fort Yuma maintained peace and protected the important Yuma crossing, which was used by thousands of travelers each year.[5]

The Army constructed a second facility in 1865, the Yuma Quartermaster Depot, to act as a supply base for Army posts throughout Arizona and parts of New Mexico. Supplies were delivered by riverboats and transported from the depot to military outposts by wagon. After Fort Yuma and the Yuma Quartermaster Depot closed in the 1880s, the Army did not return to Yuma on a permanent basis until World War II.[5]

Yuma Proving Ground traces its history to Camp Laguna and the Army Corps of Engineers Yuma Test Branch, both activated in 1943. Located on the Colorado River, the Yuma Test Branch conducted testing on combat bridges, amphibious vehicles, and boats. Tens of thousands of mechanized and infantry soldiers were trained at Camp Laguna for duty at combat fronts throughout the world, from North Africa to the South Pacific. Abandoned campsites and tank trails can still be found on the proving ground.[5]

Camp Laguna lasted only until the end of World War II. The Yuma Test Branch was closed in 1949 and reactivated two years later as the Yuma Test Station, under the operational control of the Sixth U.S. Army. In 1962, the station was named Yuma Proving Ground and reassigned to the U. S. Army Materiel Command as an important component of the Test and Evaluation Command. On 26 July 1973, it officially received its full name – U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground. The following year it was designated as a Department of Defense Major Range and Test Facility Base.[5]

Since its early days, Yuma Proving Ground has been a desert environmental test center for all types of military equipment and materiel. However, developmental and a variety of other types of testing of artillery systems and ammunition, aircraft armament and targeting systems, mobility equipment, and air delivery systems, not necessarily desert environmental-related, now comprise the bulk of the workload. A heavy investment in technology and a highly skilled soldier-civilian workforce makes the proving ground a significant social and economic component of the local community.[5]

YTC's primary ranges: Cibola Range, Kofa Range, and the Laguna Test Area where YPG headquarters in located

YTC encompasses 1,307.8 square miles (3,387.2 km²) of the northwestern Sonoran Desert[2] and conducts tests on nearly every weapon in the ground combat arsenal. Nearly all the long-range artillery testing for U.S. ground forces takes place at the YTC in an area almost completely removed from urban encroachment and noise concerns. Restricted airspace controlled by the test center amounts to over 2,000 square miles (5,000 km²). YTC has the longest overland artillery range (40 miles or 64 kilometres) in the nation, the most highly instrumented helicopter armament test range in the Department of Defense, over 200 miles (300 km) of improved road courses for testing tracked and wheeled military vehicles, over 600 miles (1,000 km) of fiber-optic cable linking test locations, and the most modern mine and demolitions test facility in the western hemisphere. Realistic villages and road networks representing urban areas in Southwest Asia have been constructed and are used for testing counter-measures to the threat of roadside bombs. It is estimated that the track can be used to test about 80 percent of the Army's wheeled vehicle fleet.

More than 3,000 people, mostly civilians, work at YTC, which is the largest employer in Yuma County.

In a typical year, over 500,000 artillery, mortar and missile rounds are fired, 36,000 parachute drops take place, 200,000 miles (320,000 km) are driven on military vehicles, and over 4,000 air sorties are flown from YTC's Laguna Army Airfield.

About 10 percent of the YTC's workload is training. In a typical year, dozens of units come to the facility for realistic desert training, especially before deploying overseas.

YTC's clean air, low humidity, skimpy rainfall – only about 3 inches (76 mm) per year – and annual average of 350 sunny days, add up to almost perfect testing and training conditions. Urban encroachment and noise concerns are nonexistent problems, unlike at many other military installations.

YTC tests improvised explosive devices, commonly known as IEDs, the number-one killer of American service men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan. Hundreds of unmanned aerial vehicles fly at the proving ground each year from the six airfields located at YTC, as do helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft conducting personnel and cargo parachute drops.

Many friendly foreign nations also visit YTC to conduct test programs.[6]

The General Motors Desert Proving Ground – Yuma opened at YTC in late July 2009. General Motors built the facility at a cost of more than $100 million after closing its desert automotive test facility in Mesa, Arizona, that had been in operation since 1953. The new facility allows General Motors and Army automotive testers to test their wheeled vehicles all year-round.

YTC offers the following for testing, evaluation, and training purposes:

• Ground weapons systems from small arms to long range artillery
• Helicopter armament and target acquisition systems
• Artillery and tank munitions
• Cargo and personnel parachutes, including guided systems technologies
• Land mines and mine-removal systems
• Tracked and wheeled vehicles in a desert environment
• Vibration and interference-free tests of smart weapon systems
• Laguna Army Airfield complex, featuring two runways – 6,000 feet (1,800 m) and 5,150 feet (1,570 m).
• 12 drop zones and multiple airstrips for Unmanned Aerial Systems
• A 55-mile (89 km) overland artillery range, the longest in the nation
• Over 200 miles (300 km) of improved road courses for tracked and wheeled vehicles
• State-of-the-art fiber optics systems to acquire, reduce and transmit data in real time
• Specialized facilities for testing countermeasures for the defeat of roadside bombs, such as the National Counterterrorism/Counterinsurgency Integrated Test and Evaluation site

Examples of the various tests and activities conducted at YTC

• 
  YTC's Ground Combat Systems test-fires a M109A6 self-propelled howitzer at a YTC artillery range.
• 
  A Royal Danish Army Piranha V infantry fighting vehicle conducts testing at YTC's water fording pit.
• 
  A M1126 infantry carrier vehicle conducting desert mobility testing at YTC
• 
  An M1 main battle tank climbs a 60° incline, part of performance testing at YTC.
• 
  Roadside improvised explosive device countermesture testing at YTC
• 
  An AH-64D attack helicopter conducts AGM-179 air-to-surface missile live-fire test on Cibola Range at YTC.
• 
  The Military Free-Fall School's MSG George A Bannar Wind Tunnel at YTC is the world's largest, supporting eight simultaneous jumpers.[7]
• 
  NASA's Orion Spacecraft Capsule Parachute Assembly System testing at YTC
• 
  Marines prepare to breach a building during a mock helicopter raid at YTC, part of U.S. Marine Corps Weapons and Tactics Instructor Course.
• 
  German soldiers test new assault rifles at YTC.
• 
  An MQ-9B unmanned aerial vehicle used the Laguna Army Airfield at YTC to achieve a 48.2 hour endurance record and first FAA certification of an unmanned aircraft to fly in civilian air space.[8]
• 
  U.S. Customs and Border Protection's tethered aerostat radar system at YTC

Yuma Proving Ground is a census-designated place (CDP) covering the residential population of the Yuma Proving Ground in Yuma County, Arizona.[9]

It first appeared as a CDP in the 2020 Census with a population of 313.[10]

• Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) No. AZ-5, "Yuma Proving Ground, Yuma, Yuma County, AZ", 39 data pages

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33°01′04″N 114°15′09″W