A United States Air Force base nestled in the omnipresent heat and humidity of the Sunshine State might be the last place you’d think state-of-the-art aircraft would flock to see how they stand up in the ruthless conditions of 40 degrees below zero, but it’s actually the first and only place.

“They’ve seen virtually every aircraft in the Western World for the past 40 years or so,” said Billie Flynn, test pilot.

It’s called the McKinley Climatic Lab, and there’s really no other facility like it. Cold, hot, wet, dry — you name it — it can mimic Mother Nature (in small doses).

Here’s more from the Associated Press:

Located on Eglin Air Force Base, the … lab – built in 1947 and extensively renovated in subsequent decades – has been used to test everything from the cold-weather survival skills of military troops to the extreme heat and cold tolerances of the military’s most-advanced stealth fighter jets. The climate lab consists of a 55,000-square foot main test chamber and four smaller test chambers. Weather conditions are simulated using several industrial refrigeration units and large gas boilers.

Temperatures inside the main chamber can range from -60 to 160 degrees Fahrenheit and test engineers can simulate just about any weather conditions including wind, rain, dust, fog and ice.

The most common things that could go wrong include engines sucking in too many hunks of ice (or snow) and electronics going haywire in very hot, hot heat.

Here are a few videos where you can see in living color how the engineers and staff at the lab perform the tests across the spectrum of atmospheric possibilities. First one up is Airbus and their A350 XWB model:

And a second — here’s the infamous F-35B (U.S. Marine Corps) going through the McKinley wringer this past winter: