FighterControl

Anyone know the dates for next years FF?

Ian

Ian,
Have a look on Scramble's SIS summary.
Freeman

According to Scramble SIS 27/03/17 to 07/04/2017 http://www.scramble.nl/sis-summary

That would make sense, Good Friday is the following week so it'd need to be over before Easter unless they're planning to run into May, which I doubt?

Hi all

The German typhoon's should be from norvenich


Cheers

Stephen

I see on Scramble that this maybe the last FF until 2020?

Also in the same Scramble section it mentions HL F-35s into Europe this summer

Polish F16's have cancelled, all others are still on the list

slogen51 wrote:I see on Scramble that this maybe the last FF until 2020?

Also in the same Scramble section it mentions HL F-35s into Europe this summer

Whats the reason for that?

Ian

I think the scramble correspondent mentioned that Leeuwarden would be busy working up the Lightnings - time will tell.

https://www.defensie.nl/binaries/defens ... crt%29.pdf

Sorry in Dutch.

If the JZ's are participating they should be due over in the next week or so?

Hi

I'm tempted to spend a couple of days at Leeuwarden in the first week of April to take a look at what's going on. But a lot depends on how visible and/or enthusiast-friendly the base is.

Google Maps suggests that viewing's not that wonderful but could anyone help, please?

Cheers

Dave

Leeuwarden is very spotter friendly and a great base.

The viewing area is adjacent to the approach and holding point. It is a lot better if they land over the viewing area but the other end does have unofficial parking capacity for a lot of vehicles by the road side.


During the exercise you usually get 40-50 departures/recoveries twice a day.

Dave, we've been for FF for the last 4 years. Last year they opened the field next to the spotters mound for parking, think we paid 3 Euros for the day. Great base, well worth the effort.

Dave
I agree with the other posts, well worth a visit. I'd add that, unless the weather is completely different this year, be prepared for some cold windy weather and if you are lucky there may be some sunshine - so it's not just the UK that has carp weather!

Don't know what other people think, but if you do photos then i think the morning session is better because the sun is down the runway for the afternoon recoveries?

Yep. To be honest we've always (with one exception when they were landing from the other end) gone to the area near the mound. Not sure how far round to the opposite side of the runway you can get (I imagine if you go back to the road they'd be too high when they're recovering?) to counteract the sun? Nice that the sun's an issue in the Northern Netherlands in March to be honest!

Yeah if there landing over the official viewing are (i think its runway 05) then morning landings are great.
Afternoon recoveries start to get a little backlit from there.I think going to the other side of the runway is a bit limited there and a long walk.

Ian

After much rumour-milling, it now appears that the 12 ANG Eagles expected for FF will now go direct to Leeuwarden and not via Lakenheath this weekend as had been suggested, which makes more sense!

Nothing confirmed yet but there's talk of a late afternoon arrival into Leeuwarden on Tuesday 21st.

Time will tell I guess! This is a tad inconvenient as it now means a 1500 mile round trip to Leeuwarden rather than a 400-mile one to Lakenheath, although in truth we were looking for an excuse to go to FF again anyway!

Times now suggested on Scramble are for a 1615 and 1645 local time arrival at Leeuwaarden for the F-15's in two flights of six, minus an hour for GMT.