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RAF Lakenheath - Tuesday 25th


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Went to Lakenheath yesterday with the old man for the first time in yonks. Despite the grim forecasts and reports of little activity, we took a chance as these days it's the only game in town from our neck of the woods - Coningsby is just too far for a day out, Cottesmore is dead and Coltishall is no longer with us. :woot.gif:

Anyway - although these photos won't show it, it was actually a pleasant day weather wise, if you ignore the thunderstorm at lunchtime! That aside, plenty of sunshine and now the sunburn to match, but as sods law will dictate, the clouds intervened to rob me of the sunlight as soon as anything came onto the approach.

Fairly busy activity wise too, with about 20x F-15s active in the morning and a handful PM with a C-17, C-130, E-6 and a NATO E-3A that popped in for some circuit bashing at sunset.

All taken on an EOS 300D with an EF 75-300mm lens.

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Nice photos. I especially like the HC-130. It is apparently one of the old ARRS birds with the refueling pods, flare dispensers on the ramp and the large scanning window just behind the crew entrance door. New is the sensor under the nose radome and the ??? square thingie under the crew door.

DArwin

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A great bunch of pix,Loved the Beagle shots especially,.........If I saw correctly the AIM's looked live. It would be interesting to do a study to see which has had more mods and versions '130's or F-4's.

Edited by PhantomPhoenix
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No one's mentioned them yet, but all of those pic's of the old smoky thingy are just fantastic!!

Particularly liked the 2 rear right, 3/4 shots of the F-15E - it was the shadow of the AIM-120's on the pylon that caught my eye - brilliant,

Super pic's as always.

Eng <_<

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Thanks for the comments guys. C-130 was the last movement before the storm hit, and we had heavy rain just a few moments later. That thinned out the 'spectators' and by the time the weather cleared, I was the only one there with a camera for the sunset activity. :blink:

Thought the E-3 had gone back home, so headed back to the car and packed the camera away when he came back for another approach and flew right infront of the sunset you see in the last picture. Would have made a nice photo! :yahoo:

All the munitions are training rounds with the blue bands, and some were also carrying ACMI pods under the starboard wing.

As for the slime lights - no idea. Ask the aircrafts designers! :P

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Nice ! Gotta love watching aeroplanes coming and going.....what a treat !

I have to agree with the boys...the Herc shot is just awesome. Something about those SOC types. And the old AWACs as well.....nothing like the noisy ols smokers !

What are you using for a camera/ lens ?

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