By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Jul 29, 2010 8:31:31 EDT

The Air Force has one fewer base with Wednesday’s closure of Onizuka Air Force Station, northwest of San Jose, Calif.

Orders to close the 11-acre station, also known as the “Blue Cube” for the urban complex’s largest building, arrived as part of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission report. The station opened in 1960 as the Air Force Satellite Test Center.

Onizuka had been home to the 21st Space Operations Squadron where the focus was satellite communications and keeping the Air Force Satellite Control Network in operation.

The 21st is now part of Vandenberg Air Force Base in southern California.

The station’s namesake is the late Lt. Col. Ellison Onizuka, an Air Force astronaut who died in the 1986 explosion of the space shuttle Challenger. In honor of Onizuka, the 21st’s new home at Vandenberg is called the Onizuka Satellite Operations Facility.