I've already mentioned in this Plane Spotting post, that I am lucky to live near to an active RAF (Royal Air Force) Base. There is activity every day during the week (although not at weekends apparently). Usually it features the Aircraft based here such as the Rivet Joint or the Sentry E-3D, but it is always worth a visit as there is often other aircraft passing through, although it is pot luck what turns up.
Last year we found out that the Cobra Warrior Exercise was taking place in September, and that a large group of fighter aircraft were going to be based at RAF Waddington for at least 2 weeks!
German Eurofighter Typhoon
There were going to be lots of Eurofighters, some from the German Air Force and some from the Italian Air Force. The real highlight was that the Israeli Air Force were going to be joining exercise with their F-15's. This was a rare occurrence here in the UK, and after hearing the news people travelled from all across the country to watch them.
Israeli F-15e Strike Eagle
The actual exercise took place over the North Sea (about 150 miles North East of the base. Therefore we would only see the planes taking off, and then coming in to land a few hours later. There was an opputunity to see them taxing on the runway which allowed for some different images
Pair of German Eurofighter Typhoon's on the runway
The main aim of the exercise, was to give the various Air Forces of each country an opportunity to train together while undertaking various combat scenarios.
This image shows one of each of the Air Forces based at RAF Waddington. On the left hand side of the image is the German Eurofighter, on the right is the Italian Eurofighter and leading the way in the middle is the Israeli F-15e Strike Eagle.
As mentioned the exercise ran for about 3 weeks, and I made the most of it by visiting on at least 8 separate occasions over that time frame. I took literally thousands of images, but I think I managed to get a few decent shots out of it...
It was a brilliant and very noisy few weeks, and I enjoyed every minute of it!
Israeli F-15e Strike Eagle - preparing to land