The organisation

Located 25 miles South-West of Paris, at the centre of the Brie region, the Paris-Villaroche airfield is a former test flight airbase.
This compound was occupied in turns by the French, then the German and then American Air Forces.
After WWII, the Snecma company established its offices near the runways, whereas Dassault Aviation started testing there their Ouragan, Mystère, Mirage, Balzac, and other aircraft.
Other aircraft manufacturers such as Breguet Aviation, René Hirsch, René Leduc, Morane-Saulnier, or Potez Aviation, the  SNCAN and the SNCASO are assembling their aircraft there too.

At the end of 1946, buildings and hangars are built North of the runways and then a control tower is added.
In December 1947, the Snecma – now known as Safran Aircraft Engines – start their test flights, after moving from the Vélizy-Villacoublay airfield. The engine division of the Safran group has gone down in the history of aeronautics with assembling military engines such as the M53 (Mirage 2000) or the M88 (Rafale) but also the civilian  CFM and Leap reactors, that are the most produced aircraft engines in the world. They are used, among others, on the Airbus A320 and the Boeing 737.
On the 28th February 1948, Colonel Constantin Rozanoff was the first to take off from the Melun-Villaroche airfield in a jet, a Dassault Ouragan fitted with Rolls-Royce Nene engines.
Sadly, he died in a crash on 3rd avril 1954 when displaying the Mystère IV, because of a flight control failure. 

During the 1980’s, the runways are 60 m wide and 2800 meters long (1 972 m now) and 2 400 meters (now 1 300 m), permitting aircraft over 60 tons to land. 
The airfield, that had been managed by the armament direction (DGA), for the Ministry of Defence for a long time, was passed on to the Ministry of Transportation in January 1982.
Test flights were then moved to Brétigny, Istres and then at Cazaux in order to avoid the busy Parisian air space constraints.