Simpson Lake DEW Line Station

Military decommissioning. The station was closed as part of the transition from the Distant Early Warning (DEW) Line to the new North Warning System (NWS). The end of the Cold War and advancements in satellite and radar technology made the DEW Line's mission and equipment obsolete.

The site is abandoned and has been decommissioned. As part of the comprehensive DEW Line Clean-Up Project initiated by Canada's Department of National Defence, the site has undergone extensive environmental remediation to remove hazardous materials such as PCBs, fuel contaminants, and lead paint. All buildings have been demolished, and the land has been restored to as close to its natural state as possible. The airstrip is unmaintained, not officially charted, and considered unusable for any regular aviation purposes.

The Simpson Lake station, officially designated CAM-D, was an Intermediate Station within the DEW Line. Constructed in the mid-1950s, the DEW Line was a critical Cold War defense system designed to provide early warning of a potential Soviet bomber attack over the North Pole. CAM-D was an unmanned doppler radar station that filled the low-altitude surveillance gap between the larger, manned Main stations (in this case, CAM-C at Shepherd Bay and CAM-E at Keith Bay). The 3,100-foot gravel airstrip was essential for its construction, logistical support, and periodic maintenance, allowing access for aircraft like the de Havilland Canada DHC-3 Otter and Douglas C-47 Skytrain in an extremely isolated environment with no road access.

There are no plans or prospects for reopening the airport. Its original strategic purpose is defunct, and its extreme remote location in the Nunavut tundra, far from any communities or economic activity, presents no viable civilian or commercial use case.