The U.S. Navy will be conducting training exercises with live bombs in the Ocala National Forest in the coming week.
The training will take place at the Pinecastle Range Complex from August 7, 2013, through August 9, 2013, between the hours of 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.
The United States Navy’s Pinecastle Bombing Range, located in the Ocala National Forest, is the only place on the East Coast where the Navy can do live impact training.
The Navy drops nearly 20,000 bombs a year at the site, a few hundred of which are live.
The Pinecastle Bombing Range is a fenced 5,760 acre area, with the eastern edge of the range located about two miles west of State Road 19 and the Camp Ocala campgrounds, and one-half mile west of the Farles Lake campground.
F/A-18 Hornet jet fighters and other aircraft take off from Naval Air Station Jacksonville or from aircraft carriers off the Florida coast, fly low over the forest, and drop their bombs in the middle 450 acres of the range. All air-to-ground exercises using conventional ordnance up to and including 500 pound MK 82 bombs and five-inch Zuni rockets are authorized.
Napalm and High Explosive Incendiary (HEI) are prohibited. Live ordnance is restricted to the Live Ordnance Impact Area; inert ordnance is used on all other targets.
Pinecastle targets have also been certified for laser operations. The Navy has used the area for target practice for 50 years under a special use permit from the U.S. Forest Service.
Residents are asked to call (800) 874-5059 if the noise gets to be too loud.
For more information call (904) 542-5588.