601st Air Operations Center

601st Air Operations Center
Airmen coordinate airspace activity at the 601st Air and Space Operations Center, 2010
Active	1 November 2007 – present
Country	United States
Branch	United States Air Force
Role	Command and Control
Part of	Air Combat Command First Air Force
Garrison/HQ	Tyndall AFB, Florida
Nickname(s)	America's AOC
Insignia
601st Air and Space Operations Center emblem

The 601st Air Operations Center (601 AOC) is an active unit of the United States Air Force, assigned to the First Air Force and stationed at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida. The unit plans, directs, and assesses air operations for the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) as the Continental U.S. NORAD Region (CONR), and the United States Northern Command (NORTHCOM), as the operations hub for First Air Force. It provides aerospace warning and control for NORAD Defensive Counter Air (DCA) activities. It also directs Air Force activities in support of NORTHCOM homeland security and civil support missions. The 601 AOC directs all air sovereignty activities for the continental United States.^[1]

The 601st Air & Space Operations Center was activated on 1 November 2007 at Tyndall.^[2] The DAF/A1M letter directing this action was dated 25 October 2007, and is almost certainly the date of the center's constitution. Other Air Operations Centers dropped the "space" from their name in late 2014. Simultaneous with the center's activation, the 701st Air Defense Squadron, 1st Information Operations Flight, and Air Forces Northern (First Air Force), Provisional, were all inactivated. Manning for America's AOC primarily comes from the 101st Air and Space Operations Group (AOG) of the Florida Air National Guard. The 101st AOG, formally known as the Southeast Air Defense Sector, stood up on July 1, 2009.^[3]