Posted on April 23, 2025
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. — The commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Los Angeles District visited two Air Force installations April 3 to meet with project partners and assess progress on key construction efforts.
Col. Andrew Baker met with members of the district’s Edwards Resident Office team and toured the new Flight Test Engineering Laboratory at Edwards and the Building 531 Rehabilitation Project at nearby Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale.
Flight Test Engineering Laboratory
Officially opened in 2024, the Flight Test Engineering Laboratory, or FTEL, is a two-story, 75,000-square-foot laboratory and office complex designed to support the Air Force in advancing and evaluating emerging warfighting technologies. Its mission includes improving sensor precision, enabling long-range data link communications and merging flight test data with advanced modeling and simulation tools.
Edwards and its surrounding installations offer ideal airspace for open-air testing, including bombing ranges, supersonic corridors and low-altitude, high-speed maneuver zones. The base itself has played a pivotal role in aviation history, most notably in 1947, when then-Capt. Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in the Bell X-1. While these vast ranges support dynamic flight activities, the FTEL provides a more controlled testing environment. It helps minimize external factors, such as atmospheric conditions, dust and temperature fluctuations that might otherwise compromise data integrity.
The new facility replaces a building that was more than 70 years old. Jason Bostjancic, deputy director of the 412th Test Engineering Group, said the previous facility had shown clear signs of age and was due for replacement. Demolition of the old structure was included in the project’s initial scope of work, as the Air Force works to reduce its infrastructure footprint across North America.
Bostjancic emphasized the importance of modernizing the workspace to ensure Air Force professionals have access to facilities that match their expertise and mission demands.
“Our technical experts are, in many cases, world-class experts,” Bostjancic said. “We’ve had instances in the past where we advised other nations on how to conduct tests. Certainly, we are the folks with the expertise for the Air Force at large, and Edwards Air Force Base is where developmental testing lives. Having a modern, professional space for our world-class experts to operate out of — I can’t express how much that changes the dynamic for us.”
Although the facility was designed with the latest technology in mind, rapid advancements since the design phase have already prompted updates to meet evolving standards. Sarah Coles, project engineer with the LA District, said these in-progress updates required a united effort with project partners and careful management of resources.
“Teamwork is huge, especially since this building is an engineering lab complex,” Coles said. “Having that close coordination between USACE, our contracting partners and the Air Force was critical in updating the design as best as possible, while still staying within the contingency amount we were allotted, all while staying true to the original intent of the building.”
Building 531 Rehabilitation Project
At Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, Baker also visited Building 531, where the LA District is overseeing a major rehabilitation project that is more than 80 percent complete.
The building — once a dedicated hangar used in aircraft testing going back to the 1940s — today supports vehicle maintenance for the fire department and other government vehicles. It also houses plumbing and carpentry shops. More than 3,000 square feet of the hangar space is being converted into office space.
“We have constructed, within the building, a brand-new mezzanine structure, which includes office spaces below, as well as storage up above,” said Brittany Sonier, LA District engineering technician and contracting officer’s representative. “We’ve rehabbed both sides of the building. All the office spaces have been gutted and rebuilt, and we’re also laying down new epoxy flooring inside the hangar bay.”
As a historic structure, the building’s exterior must remain intact.
“When we fixed the exterior windows, we had to maintain the original specifications — we could only scrape and repaint them,” Sonier said. “And the exterior siding had to be matched to the original pattern to preserve the historical look.”
The LA District is working with Edwards Air Force Base and the 412th Civil Engineering Squadron to deliver the project in partnership with the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio.
Supporting the Mission
The LA District’s military construction program supports 15 military installations across three states, serving more than 185,000 military personnel. In fiscal year 2024 alone, the program includes more than $326 million in active projects. In addition to military construction, the district delivers Civil Works, International and Interagency Services, Emergency Management, Regulatory, Small Business and Tribal Partnership Program missions.
