MCAS Miramar: Top Gun Country
Near La Jolla, California
Before it became a Marine Corps air station, this base north of San Diego was home to the Navy's most famous flying school. The Naval Fighter Weapons School, better known as Top Gun, operated at Miramar from nineteen sixty-nine to nineteen ninety-six, training the Navy's best fighter pilots in air combat maneuvering. The school's reputation became pop culture legend through the nineteen eighty-six film of the same name, much of which was filmed here, off the San Diego coast and at Fallon in Nevada.
Top Gun moved to Naval Air Station Fallon in Nevada in nineteen ninety-six, and the Navy later handed Miramar to the Marine Corps. The Marines renamed it and continue operating it as a major West Coast tactical air installation. The Miramar Air Show, held each fall, draws more than seven hundred thousand spectators and features the Navy's Blue Angels demonstration team.
