FOB Ripley

24 May 2007

Forward Operating Base (FOB) Ripley is a substabtial coalition base in Oruzgan Province close to Tarin Kowt airport, some 20 km south of the town of Tarin Kowt. It is not confirmed that Australian forces used the FOB, but it is likely that FOB Ripley was one of several unnamed US or coalition forward operating bases depicted on Operation Slipper Images websites as being used by the Special Forces Task Group 2006-6.

Forward Operating Base (FOB) Ripley -  [Google Earth*]

*Google Earth (free download) required.

Re: FOB Ripley, Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan Province, Afgh [Re: Uruzganweblogmaster], Google Earth Community, #787027 - 02/07/07 03:40 AM

"The image is edited and the base is gone! If you zoom out you still can see the outlines of the original image! Another example of censorship."

22d MEU (SOC) Hercules Flex Their Muscle In South-Central Afghanistan, Marine Corps News, 17 May 2004, GlobalSecurity.org

Establishment of FOB Ripley and its use by Marine KC-130 aircraft in 2004.

Marines deliver in Mountain Storm, Colonel Kenneth F. McKenzie, Major Roberta L. Shea, and Major Christopher Phelps, U.S. Marine Corps, the Naval Institute Proceedings, November 2004

"Establishment of the FOB was critical to the MEU’s concept of sustainment and combat power projection. Named after Marine Colonel John W. Ripley of Dong Ha fame, the base would feature a 6,000-foot runway, a complete helicopter fueling and rearming point, and 13 helicopter landing pads. The MEU command-and-control center was set up in the middle of the Oruzgan bowl. "