Afterburner.nl - Tigermeet 2004

Tigers at Schleswig-Jagel
From 30 August until 3 September Aufklarungs Geschwader 51 will host this years Tiger Meet. AG51 is based at Schleswig Jagel air base, which is situated in the north of Germany. The Sunday before there was an air show at Ronneby air base in the south of Sweden. En route back home from this show we passed Schleswig on Monday. It seemed a good idea to us to make a stop here because the Tiger participants were due to arrive.

The weather started fine that morning. As we arrived at the field, just after nine o' clock in the morning, lots of aviation enhtusiasts already gathered in the approach area. Among them, many friends who also went to Ronneby. Local Tornados departed for their mission. We actually didn't expect them to fly because of the upcoming event and all the hassle that comes along with it.

The landing area of runway 23 is very good for taking pictures at Schleswig. Standing on a hill you have a clear view on apporaching aircraft. Fighters can be shot with approx. 300mm. Taxying aircraft can also be photographed easily, however you need at least 400mm for that.

Around 10.15h the first participants arrived in the form of 4 Tornados from JBG32. One of which was wearing a nice colour scheme. After their arrival aircraft kept on coming. In the mean while clouds developed rapidly and it was just a matter of time until the first showers would appear. Unfortunately this resulted in many pictures without sunlight on the aircraft. In the course of the afternoon even thunderstorms with hail broke out!

In our view these were the highlights: a homebased Tornado with an excellent paint, a Mirage 2000 from Mont de Marsan wearing a nice tiger jacket, the presence of two Bandirma based F-16s fitted with tiger striped tanks and a KC-135E with a large tiger print on the forward fuselage. Also a Czech contigent consisting of 4 Hinds and a Hip was impressive, especially their approach!