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Rainy South, Nyutabaru Airbase and Kanoya, May 25 thru 27

After Akeno, it was down South, via Hiroshima towards Miyazaki where we took in in a kind of hostel. Just an hour drive from the city was the famous JASDF base Nyutabaru!! As excited as we were we stood next to the runway at spot 4 on a Tuesday morning. Spot 7 was not useful as there is lots of construction works going on. We stood there however to find out that there would be no flying activities today. After the usual checks by security a local spotter already told us the first flights were cancelled and aroun noon a friendly security passed by on bike and spook to us in English that the missions for today were all cancelled because of the bad weather. Well, just around the airbase it was rather good weather, but as we indeed heard on the news and saw on the way: a typhoon/tropical storm was heading towards us fast. We decided to drive to Kanoya instead where through rain and winds we caught the last actions in heavy rain. The same schedule was worked of the next day when again there were no flying activities. Our last day in the area was our only hope... and that morning we saw a lot of aircraft on the platforms. This is however common and could just as well be engine runs as we experienced before. And indeed, all the 6 aggressor F15s did just an engine run... No sign of Phantoms. But one F15 was out flying and came back whereafter the rest of the 10 also went! They thought it was good enough to fly! At last some activity. And boy what a great opportunities one has for photography around the base! Too bad the other squadrons did not fly... a reason to go back! We spent most of our time at spot 3 and 1! As they are busy constructing and refurbishing at the base there are a lot of obstacles, but the runway in use is only 10 meters away from the fence at spot 3!

Spotting seasons

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2005

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