RAF North Pickenham is a former Royal Air Force

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 base near North Pickenham

North Pickenham

North Pickenham is a village in the Breckland district of mid-Norfolk, East Anglia, England in the United Kingdom. Named after its leader Pinca, Pica or maybe Piccea with ham meaning homestead, it became a pagan Anglo Saxon settlement in the 5th century AD...

, in Norfolk

Norfolk

Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...

. It was originally opened in 1944 and finally closed in 1965.
North Pickenham was constructed in 1943/1944 for the United States Army Air Forces

United States Army Air Forces

The United States Army Air Forces was the military aviation arm of the United States of America during and immediately after World War II, and the direct predecessor of the United States Air Force....

 Eighth Air Force

Eighth Air Force

The Eighth Air Force is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Global Strike Command . It is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana....

 as a heavy bomber base. It was assigned USAAF designation Station 143.
The first USAAF group to use North Pickenham was the 492d Bombardment Group (Heavy), arriving from Alamogordo AAF, New Mexico

New Mexico

New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...

 on 18 April 1944.