KC-10 Driver
12th Aug 2006, 23:50
My family and I were in Switzerland a few days ago -- we were visiting Jungfraujoch (nicknamed "The Top of Europe"). I was up at about 12,000 feet with my wife and kids for a couple of hours.
My oldest son got altitude sickness, so we had to expedite his descent. He and I got to sit in the engineer's compartment on the cog train (which was pretty cool, in and of itself, besides the fact that my son was dry heaving all the way down).
In any case, in the course of the conversation between the engineer and myself, he told me about an annual live fire exercise held by the Swiss Air Force.
He told me that the exercise is called Axalp, and it is held near Brienz. He told me that the exercise is held in a canyon -- the aircraft fire into one side of the canyon, and the general public sits on the other side of the canyon. The spectators, in many cases, actually sit above and look down upon the aircraft during their strafing and bombing runs.
Based upon my initial research, I believe the aircraft are probably based at Meiringen-Unterbach airfield, if that makes a difference.
Does anyone here know anything about this? I would like any information about what I need to do to attend.
The train engineer told me that the event was open to the general public, with no restrictions. I believe he said it is held in October. I would love to attend this with my kids. Any advice would be appreciated.
My oldest son got altitude sickness, so we had to expedite his descent. He and I got to sit in the engineer's compartment on the cog train (which was pretty cool, in and of itself, besides the fact that my son was dry heaving all the way down).
In any case, in the course of the conversation between the engineer and myself, he told me about an annual live fire exercise held by the Swiss Air Force.
He told me that the exercise is called Axalp, and it is held near Brienz. He told me that the exercise is held in a canyon -- the aircraft fire into one side of the canyon, and the general public sits on the other side of the canyon. The spectators, in many cases, actually sit above and look down upon the aircraft during their strafing and bombing runs.
Based upon my initial research, I believe the aircraft are probably based at Meiringen-Unterbach airfield, if that makes a difference.
Does anyone here know anything about this? I would like any information about what I need to do to attend.
The train engineer told me that the event was open to the general public, with no restrictions. I believe he said it is held in October. I would love to attend this with my kids. Any advice would be appreciated.