Minuteman Launch Facility Q-08 (Quebec-08 LF), Chugwater Wyoming

Q-08 sat in the kind of place the Peacekeeper program depended on: open Wyoming range, a gravel access road, a fence line, utility poles, and almost nothing on the surface to suggest the scale of the weapon once sealed underground. It was not a public showpiece like Quebec 01, and it was not a famous accident site. Its importance is quieter. Q-08 was one of the ordinary hardened silos that made the late-Cold War Peacekeeper force real.

Launch Facility Q-08 was an unmanned missile silo / Launch Facility in Quebec Flight, controlled from Q-01, the Quebec 01 Missile Alert Facility / Launch Control Facility. The site belonged to the F.E. Warren Air Force Base missile field, the 90th Strategic Missile Wing during the Strategic Air Command era, and the 400th Strategic Missile Squadron / later 400th Missile Squadron during the Minuteman and Peacekeeper years. It was originally built for the LGM-30B Minuteman I, later served in the Minuteman III force, and was then converted for the LGM-118A Peacekeeper.

Q-08 lay in the high-plains missile landscape between Cheyenne and Chugwater, in the same general Quebec Flight cluster as Q-01 and the other Q-series launch facilities. The landscape mattered because the Minuteman and later Peacekeeper systems relied on dispersal. Each launch facility was separated from the others and from its control facility so that a single attack could not easily disable the entire flight or squadron.

As a Launch Facility, Q-08 was normally unmanned. Missile combat crews worked from the underground Launch Control Center at Q-01, while maintenance teams, security forces, communications personnel, and other specialists visited the launch facility as needed. The site itself was a hardened, fenced installation containing the belowgrade launcher structure and aboveground support features. It was not a crew residence or command post; that role belonged to the Q-01 Missile Alert Facility.

Public exterior photographs taken in 2013 show Q-08 as a fenced former Peacekeeper launch compound with a gravel access road and gate, security fencing, power and light poles, and visible surface support elements. The photo set is useful because ordinary Peacekeeper launch facilities were later subject to treaty-driven elimination and land-disposition actions. For Q-08, those photographs help document the site in the short interval after Peacekeeper retirement but before the full effects of New START elimination and subsequent land disposition.

Q-08 was built as part of the 400th Strategic Missile Squadron's Minuteman deployment at F.E. Warren. The broader Warren Minuteman program placed 200 Minuteman I launch facilities and 20 launch-control facilities into service around the base. Quebec Flight was one of the flights assigned to the 400th Strategic Missile Squadron. The Quebec 01 National Historic Landmark documentation identifies Quebec 01 and its associated launch facilities as part of the 400th Strategic Missile Squadron, which became operational in June 1965. Q-08's first operational role was therefore as one of the ten unmanned Minuteman launch facilities controlled from Q-01.

Q-08 is inactive and decommissioned. It is not a public historic site like Q-01. It was one of the 50 former F.E. Warren Peacekeeper launch facilities addressed by post-Peacekeeper arms-control and disposal planning. Public Air Force reporting in 2013 stated that the United States had chosen to permanently eliminate 50 previously deactivated F.E. Warren Peacekeeper launch facilities under New START. The planned method for the Warren Peacekeeper launch facilities was to fill the silos with earth and gravel, after which land disposition could proceed through first-refusal rights, government-agency offering, or public auction.

For the full Quebec Flight narrative, see Q-01 Missile Alert Facility / Launch Control Center

Chronology

• 1965-06 The 400th Strategic Missile Squadron, including Quebec Flight, became operational with Minuteman IB missiles.
• 1974-09-03 The 90th Strategic Missile Wing removed its last Minuteman IB from alert status.
• 1975 Minuteman III replaced Minuteman I at F.E. Warren; Minuteman II was not deployed at the base.
• 1986 Peacekeeper conversion brought former Minuteman facilities in Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, and Tango Flights into the only operational Peacekeeper missile field.
• 1986-10-10 The 90th Strategic Missile Wing had the first strategically postured Peacekeeper site.
• 1986-12-16 F.E. Warren reached initial operating capability for Peacekeeper.
• 1988 Fifty Peacekeeper missiles were in service at F.E. Warren.
• 2002 Peacekeeper deactivation began as part of the post-Cold War nuclear-force drawdown.
• 2005-09-19 The Peacekeeper missile mission ended at F.E. Warren; no Peacekeepers remained on strategic alert in the 400th Missile Squadron.
• 2011-02-05 New START entered into force.
• 2013-08-02 Public exterior photographs documented Q-08's post-Peacekeeper surface condition.
• 2013-08-23 F.E. Warren announced permanent elimination of 50 previously deactivated Peacekeeper launch facilities.
• 2014-12 The Air Force's public plan called for elimination of F.E. Warren Peacekeeper launch facilities by December 2014.

Read about the Peacekeeper Missile at F.E. Warren AFB

All Peacekeeper Missile Silo Locations

All Minuteman/Peacekeeper Missile Silo Locations