"The emissions were a significant factor" in the decision to cancel the runway-building plans, Teresa Villiers, Britain's minister of state for transport, said in an interview.
Over the next ten years, No. 5 Airfield Construction Squadron transformed the base's runways, buildings and other infrastructure into a modern facility capable of handling major operations.
The Davies commission concluded it was the best of three shortlisted options, which also included extending an existing Heathrow runway and building a new one at Gatwick.
The easiest way was to extend the runway by building it over the road and railway and into the river.
Further sites, up and down the estuary and river, would be affected by tides forced to flow around the runways and buildings.
Since arriving at the airport before dawn on Friday, marines have methodically spotted and cleared away scores of unexploded bullets, missiles and mines that litter the airport's runways and buildings.
The report will also fuel conservation concerns because, if a Thames airport was to go ahead, measures to reduce the risk of bird strikes would mean wildlife was affected far beyond the runways and buildings.
"Provoking Magic: Lighting of Ingo Maurer" is a 40-year retrospective of works by the designer, who has created lamps and lighting designs for fashion runways, public buildings, monuments and private homes.
But the site was a Grumman assembly plant for 40 years, and when the Navy, which actually owned the land, turned it over to the Town of Riverhead in 1998, it included two runways, 18 buildings with 860,000 square feet of space, a sewage treatment plant, a steam plant and the control tower.
By fall 1945, Ladd Field had grown to encompass almost 5,000 military personnel and acres of runways and buildings.
