Saw (and heard) a KC-135 flying low over Ft. Wayne today a couple times, presumably out of Grissom and doing touch and goes at KFWA (also presumably).
Couple hours later saw C-130 flying low over town. (also [also] presumably out of Grissom, etc.)
I don’t know if they do much training here, but the location would make sense. First time I’ve seen either of these in this area, and not much of anything interesting commercial aviation-wise happening here anymore since Kitty Hawk closed up a couple years back, so it was a welcome sight.
Anybody have anything further to offer?
Sorry if this is not interesting; long-time lurker and new member nods and hellos all around desperate to get his first post. First interesting thing I’ve seen aviation-wise since Collings had their B-17 and B-24 here at KGWB last summer. In this aviation black hole called northern Indiana we get all worked up over a couple military planes not based here at the ANG base at KFWA (and sometimes we get excited over them,too)
Honored to be part of the forums here and hope to someday be as informative and witty as most you folks are!
The ANG unit (the one that stole my hometown’s SPI F-16s! ) might be going on their two week “summer camp”. I know our unit in SPI used to go to Volk Field WI every year. They also deployed to other training excersizes at places like Nellis AFB, and even some places in Europe. Might very well be a deployment as such.
Could also be like you say, training. Scott AFB is about 80NM south of SPI , but we have alot of C-130’s, KC-135’s and C-40’s shooting approaches up here, we have several ILS’s without all the traffic of nearby STL, and we only 15 minutes away in one of those.
So to answer the question, could be either a deployment of sorts or training.
FWA seems to be a pretty popular place for anybody to do training, as it’s a good facility…and DEAD most of the time. I’ve seen UPS 747s doing touch and goes and practicing go-arounds here. I don’t know how much anybody knows about FWA, but it’s always seemed like a shame to me that it’s as dead as it is for the size/quality of the facilities. We had an air show here…once, in 1990, if I recall correctly (I was like 10 years old). It must have to do with location, being nestled between Chicago, Detroit, Toledo, Cleveland, Indy, etc. It seems to keep up with the city’s motto of “try to be bigger than what you really are”. At least somebody’s getting some use out of it. I need to move.
FWA used to be freight hub for Burlington until the downturn in that sector. Likewise DAY which is now, apart from the airshow weekend, a place most notable for watching grass grow. I also understand that Wilmington Oh., is going to close as well, DHL (or whatever they are now) relocating to CVG.
I think there’s a “dead hub” thread somewhere, but I can’t be bothered…
Couldn’t find a ‘dead hub’ thread; found one about ‘biggest failure’ airports, but as FWA has commercial service, don’t think it would qualify. Thanks for the suggestion.
Yeah, the last aircraft left SEPT of last year. They still do MX here so there’s usually an F-16 in the hangar at any given time. We still have some logistical operations here aside from that , and they’re working on a new flying mission (i.e. political chatter for cosmetic reasons).
It was our squadron that was involved in the 2002 friendly fire incident with the Canadian soldiers and the beleif is that had a lot to do with the decision to relocate the aircraft. I don’t know if that’s the case but some people swear to it.
Aside from that, FWA may not be the traffic capital of the world, but SPI is definitely second to them. We have UAX and AAE w/ CRJ-200’s and EMB-145s.Two days a week Direct Air operates a DC-9, and we’re getting 2 Virgin America A319s in OCT. Beyond that, aside from some Dassault Falcon MX work at what used to be Garrett Aviation (another story of corporate dessimation in the last few years) there’s not that much going on. I can remember the days of close to 60 flights a day on Britt, Allegheny, TWE, UAX, Midway Conx (version 1 and 2) Ozark, with Beech 1900, BE99, Metros, F.27s, Doinker 228s, EMB-120s, J31s, ATRs, SF3s
Plus the old F-4s and all the military transients, F-111s, F-15s,
and MCdonnell Douglas used to bring AV-8s, T-54s, F-15s F-18s up here for test flights (approaches I assume).
Ahh, reminicing.
With that said though, the commercial flights do pretty well despite being in the middle of 5 other commercial airports within 100 miles. Plus the seating capacity isn’t that much off from what it was with all the 19 seat flying.
Perhaps someone should start a “dying hubs” thread. Although I wouldn’t be particularly saddened by FWA’s lack of business if I were from, say, California. Maybe “I’m sad to see my local hub is significantly less busy than it was 10+ years ago” is more appropriate. Eh, that’s too far.
