Wiederholungskurs Meiringen,  14 March 2007

Around 1 o'clock in the afternoon we arrived at Meiringen again. There was already a lot of activity and half an hour later they finally started flying with the Hornets and Tigers. The spots mentioned on this page and the next page are taken from the Scramble Airfield Guide, which can be found on the Scramble website.

The first spot we took pictures was Spot 6 along road which leads through Unterbach. This is probably one of the best places to take pictures of the departing Hornets. The Tigers however are barely airborne at this point, so we had to find another spot for this. The first movement of the day was the departure of a PC-6 which left Emmen earlier today. After taking some shots of the departing Hornets and Tigers we decided to go to the new visitor terrace.

Close to the old Spot 5 near the Unterbachstrasse they build a new restaurant with on top of it a nice visitor terrace. This all is situated in building A, which can be found just east of the Unterbachstrasse.

They also made a nice parking place over here, so no problems at all. From the visitor terrace you have an excellent view on the ramp and landing of runway 27. Unfortunately when they use runway 09 it's a bit harder to take good pictures. The Hornets are already pretty high when they pass you during take off. Still we had a great time here on the visitor terrace and we will come back here tomorrow.

One of today's highlights was of course the Hornet with its nice tiger tail. However when you take shots at Meiringen AB, I think every departure is a highlight. It is really awesome to take shots of aircraft with such a backdrop.

History of Meiringen AB

The history of Flugplatz Meiringen goes way back, already in the end of the 1920's the first military plane landed here. In 1942 the first official military unit was stationed here, the Fl.Abt.7. In 1949 the Swiss Air Force got it's first new Vampires and Venoms delivered and nine years later the first WK was held from the caverns. One later the Hunter entered service which also flew from Meiringen. Twenty years later in 1979 the F-5 Tiger makes it's appearance and in 1994 after 35 years of active service the Hunter retired. In the end of the 90's the Swiss Air Force decided to station Hornets at Meiringen in the future so a lot of construction work was needed to fit these jets inside the caverns. In 2002 these construction works were ready and the first Hornets arrived a few years later as Flugplatz Dübendorf stopped it's jet-activity.