Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Vandenberg AFB, CA

Vandenberg AFB is a census-designated place in Santa Barbara County covering the residential population of Vandenberg Space Force Base, the U.S. military's West Coast space and missile launch site.

The installation began in 1941 as Camp Cooke, a U.S. Army post where tank, infantry, and artillery troops trained during World War II and again during the Korean War.

The property was transferred to the recently created U.S. Air Force in 1957, and on October 4, 1958, Cooke Air Force Base was renamed for General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, the Air Force's second Chief of Staff.

Vandenberg's first missile launch, a Thor intermediate-range ballistic missile, took place on December 16, 1958.

On February 28, 1959, Vandenberg launched Discoverer 1, the world's first polar-orbiting satellite — a mission that also served as cover for the Corona spy-satellite program, America's first reconnaissance satellites.

Because rockets can be launched southward over the open Pacific Ocean, Vandenberg is the United States' launch site for satellites bound for polar and sun-synchronous orbits, and it also test-fires intercontinental ballistic missiles toward the Kwajalein Atoll.

The base covers about 99,600 acres of Santa Barbara County coastline, operates roughly 16 launch facilities and complexes, and maintains a 15,000-foot runway, the second largest airfield runway in the Department of Defense.

Space Launch Complex 6 was built up in the 1980s as a Space Shuttle launch complex for polar-orbit missions, but the West Coast shuttle program was cancelled before any shuttle ever launched from Vandenberg.

The base took on its current Space Force name in 2021, when its host wing was redesignated Space Launch Delta 30 under the United States Space Force.

The 2020 census counted 3,559 residents in the Vandenberg census-designated place, up from 3,338 in 2010 but well below the 6,151 counted in 2000.