Military Jets Photography: 2008 06 21 Luchtmachtdagen Leeuwarden

The Luchtmachtdagen were held on June 20 and 21 2008. This year the show was held at Leeuwarden airbase. The organizers had attract some interesting participants and a nice mix of military and civilian acts.
Highlights of the static were offcourse the Turkish and Hellenic Phantoms but also the Hungarian Fulcrum was a delight to see.
The flying display suffered from a complaint from the surrouding neighbourhood which meant that all loud aircraft could only fly after midday. This meant that the morning was occupied by helicopters and propeller aircraft.
But the morning programme had some attractive performers like the Canadian CP-140 Aurora, the Belgian Sea King, the Royal Navy Merlin and off course the home team with their yellow AB412SP or Tweeties like they call them. On the civilian side we had a UH-1H Huey, P-51D and the OV-10B Bronco which jumped out.
After the lunch break it was time for the famous Airpower from the RNLAF. This shows what it does in operational areas. A massive take-off by lots of F-16s, simulating an air to ground attack on the airfield, involving AH-64 Apaches, Cougars and Chinooks. The RNLAF air-to-air tanker KDC-10 gave a great, low pass flyby with gear down. Finally the Dutch F-16 Demo team gave their display.
This was followed by the Polish aerobatic team Team Iskra, the NH-90NFH (in future Dutch markings but still officialy from Eurocopter), the Italian aerbotic team the Frecce Tricolori, a Spanish Hornet (which had to abort his demo because of a forgotten remove before flight pin from the landings gear), a Belgian F-16 and as last the French Mirage 2000C.
All in all was this years edition of the Luchtmachtdagen worth a visit with a nice mix from civilian and military acts. It was a shame that the fast jets could only fly after midday because then the sun had already dissapeared behind the clouds.