Germany airport comments

Nice little airport, with a gentle service of the airfield operators.

The Berlin Air Lift, "Operation Vittles", started here in 1948 with USAAF C-47 and C-54 cargo planes flying supplies into the now-closed Berlin-Templehof airport. Rhein-Main Air Base joined as the main C-54 depot, and the British flew missions from several bases in the Hamburg area. France joined the airlift later.

The southern half of the field was originally the Rhein-Main Air Base, which was the main hub for U.S. military airlifts in and out of Europe (it closed in 2005). It was also one of the main departure points for the Berlin Airlift, serving as the principal C-54 depot.

The aircraft manufacturer Dornier Flugzeugwerke (later Fairchild-Dornier) was located at Oberpfaffenhofen from the 1950s until 2002, when Fairchild-Dornier went bankrupt. This is still a major location for the German Aerospace Centre (DLR):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberpfaffenhofen

This base figured prominently in 20th-century history. It was the primary pilot training centre for the Luftwaffe during World War II, and later, the site of the Munich massacre at the 1972 Olympic games:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_massacre

It's just about the 50th anniversary of the Munich Air Disaster, when 8 members of the British Manchester United football (soccer) team and 15 other people died during a failed takeoff from this airport on a slushy runway:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_air_disaster

The airport closed in 1992 and has been redeveloped, with only the control tower and a terminal building left.

Beautifull location in southern Germany, friendly relaxed ATC

never been

I flew Ryanair out of this airport once. You have to take a bus from Frankfurt to get here -- it's about a two-hour ride -- and it leaves at 5am. I slept on a bench in the train station. Good times.

Along with Berlin-Tempelhof (THF), Tegel is scheduled to be replaced by an expanded Berlin-Schönefeld (SXF -- to be renamed "Berlin-Brandenburg International" around 2011). Tegel and Tempelhof are actually in Berlin, while Schönefeld is further out of town, in the former East Germany.

This airport (formerly in East Germany) is expanding to replace Berlin's other two principal airports. In 2011, when its new terminal is scheduled to open, it will be renamed "Berlin-Brandenburg International Airport". The historic Berlin-Tempelhof Airport (THF) is scheduled to close once the new terminal construction is underway, and Berlin-Tegel Airport (TXL) will close six months after the new terminal is complete and the airport is renamed.

From 1948-49, this airport was the command centre and destination of the Berlin Airlift -- nearly everything needed to feed, clothe, and warm 2.5 million people over 11 months through a cold winter flew in through Tempelhof, primarily in U.S. military C-47 and C-54 (DC-3 and DC-4) transports, with assistance from allies.

Tempelhof is scheduled to be closed in October 2008.

Like many things in Germany, this airport was efficient. Visited it in 1991, first time on the Continent, and I was shocked to see peach-fuzz faced boys in uniform casually holding Uzis, leaning against a wall keeping an eye on everyone.

I was disappointed not to get a stamp on my Canadian passport, as the customs officials just waved us through, possibly glancing at the cover of my passport with its regal coat of arms and assuming I was British, and therefore an EU citizen.

This airport will be of interest to a lot of the Canadian readers. There's been an airport on this site since hitler began building up the Luftwaffe. After WWII it was a candaian Forces base for many years until it was closed in the early 1960's. The Germans (West Germans at the time) were quite keen on plowing it under for farmland and it very nearly was, but for some reason the USAF decided to take it over and re-open it in 1970. I was among the first USAF folk who came here in March 1970,and it was "interesting" to say the least. The German contractor hired by Canada to clean up and secure the facilities was most dutiful in following the absolute letter of the contract. Every room in every building was carefully cleaned and every door, inside and out was carefully locked. The one thing which wasn't in the contract? What to do with the keys.

My boss and I arrived at the building designated to house our workshop one morning and the representative from Civil Engineering, the base "land lord" told us .. "The forklift will be here in a moment or two." "Forklift", we queried. We soon found out. On the pallet the forklift was carrying was 4 each 55 gallon steel drums, all full of keys. lacking specific instructions on what to do with thekeys the contractor threw them, un-tagged into steel drums for "safe keeping". "Yours are in their somewhere", our landlord said, "Just let me know when you find them and I'll send the barrels to the next lucky customers."

Needless to say, I'll always remember Zweibrucken.

After the Americans decided we no longer needed the base, better German planners than the ones a few years back made the airdrome into an important regional airport, so perhaps all the time I spent there looking for keys wasn't a waste at all ;-)