Spotting in Meiringen and Alpnach (CH)

Dysko · April 28, 2012

Hi,

some days ago Spillone104 and me went to the Swiss air bases of Alpnach and Meiringen.

Alpnach is an helicopter base. According to a famous military spotting forum, there should have been 2 CH-53s belonging to the German Army. However, we couldn't find them, so here is a photo of a single Eurocopter EC-635:

Then we went to Meiringen, an extremely spotting-friendly airbase. The base is crossed by a road, fences are very low and on the top of the base's restaurant there is a spotting terrace. We are used to spotting in Italy, where spotting is theoretically forbidden both in civilian and military airports due to laws from the Fascist era... Though they are not literally enforced, police in Italy can tell you to go away if you take photos of airplanes.

We went to Meiringen because there should have been a training course with intense flying activity. Unfortunately the soldiers there told us "Sorry, no flying activity today, only taxiing tests at 1 PM" and then "If you are interested, the Patrouille Suisse will be making a low pass at 17:45"

Here is the view from the spotting terrace:

A PC-7 from the display team PC-7 Team used for communication purposes:

We entered in what appeared to be a small museum with Hawker Hunter parts, like the ejection seat:

And various types of bullets (whoa! The GAU-8 bullet is HUGE!):

There were also an F-5 Tiger and an Alouette III. We then discovered it was a repaint hangar... Well, there weren't any "no entry" signs outside, and nobody told us anything...

Then the level crossing closed, and an F-18C Hornet with the Tiger Meet 2011 tail appeared:

We ran on the spotting terrace:

Then another F-18 was taken out of the hangar inside the mountain:

And finally Patrouille Suisse:

Thank you for watching!