This “Fliegerhorst Wunstorf” (ETNW) is located northwest of Hanover and a German Air Base. It is the home of “Lufttransport Geschwader (LTG) 62″, which owns the whole A400 fleet of the German Air Force (GAF) called “Luftwaffe”. That’s why almost all movements are A400s, which are often training here and flying their missions to the world (mostly to Africa, America and the Middle East) from here. The averga number of movements per day is around 8 depending on the weather and flightplan of assignments.

The Air Base was opened back in 1934 by the “Wehrmacht” and was taken over by the Royal Air Force after WWII. First the airfield was used as the homebase of a few British fighter squadrons, before it was used for the famous “Berliner Luftbrücke” between West Germany/BRD and West Berlin in 1948/49. Back in March 1958 Wunstorf Air Base was taken over by the “Luftwaffe” again and used to be the home of the Transall C160s and Noratlas’. From October 1978 on the Air Base is used as home base for “LTG 62” (mentioned already above), which took delivery of the first A400s, which were delivered to the “Luftwaffe”/GAF.

Written by Severin Hackenberger, David Mispelkamp and Lars Rohde. Last update: July 2023 (Spot 5 updated)

Rating
Movements
Photo Locations
Weather
Airport Information
Runways
03/21	1699m x 45m asphalt
08/26	2499m x 45m concrete
08R/26L	1088m x 40m grass(strip)
Spotting Information
Ladder	Not needed and not recommend to use!
Car/Public Transport	On nice days you can do a trip around the Base with your bycicle, but a car is much more comfortable and sometimes recommended, too.
Restrooms	In the nearby cities/villages you’ll find some restaurants or gas stations, where toilets can be found.
Drinks/Food	In the nearby cities/villages you’ll find some shops, restaurants and supermarkets.
Hotels	In the nearby cities/villages you’ll find some hotels/motels.
Season	Spring/Fall might be the best seasons, because you won’t have that much heat haze, but already/still good weather. Traffic doesn’t “knows” seasons here.
Security	Please always remind that you are spotting at an Air Base, so this is an MILITARY FACILITY! The spotters are very thankful, that spotting is that easy here at such an airfield, if you remind of the problems at only civil airports in other countries. That’s why we ask you to KEEP A LOW PROFILE, DON’T TAKE PICTURES OF MILITARY FACILITIES and DON’T STAND OUT WITH NEGATIVE ACTIONS like Using a high ladder right at the fence or parking at prohibited positions or similar. Just take your pictures, so spotters can spot here in the future, too.
Runway Usage
03/21	This runway is more and more less used, almost never. It’s the used runway, if the other one is closed for constructions or similar.
08/26	The major runway at ETNW, all planes will use this runway – if it’s not under construction works again.

	Spot #1 – Field – 08 arrivals
WHERE	This spot is no exact position rather the are along the walkway, which crosses the arrivalpath. The spot can easily reached from “B442” by using the walk- or farmways. Parking is possible by the roadisde of the “Bundesstrasse” or the picnic station (marked on the map).
WHAT	Arrivals on runway 08.
TIME	In the summer light conditions are good from morning till early evening and in the winter the whole day. This spot is much nicer, if light is falling into the propellers from the front, so we recommend the Usage of this spot in early summer mornings. Example pictures were taken around midday in early May.
MISC.	No ladder needed, parking limited, but possible by the roadside of “Bundesstrasse 442”. But park in “a nice way”, so you don’t block the whole farmroads! Everything you might need during spotting like restrooms or food/drinks can be found in the nearby village.
FOCAL LENGTH	24 – 400mm Depending on the shot you like – example shots were taken with 70-300mm.

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ETNW-Spot1

	Spot #2 – B442 – 08 arrivals
WHERE	This spot is located by the roadside of the” B442″ and is no exact position again rather the area along this street. Parking is (as everywhere here) limited and might be okay by the roadside or at the picnic station on the other side of the “Bundesstrasse” (marked on the map).
WHAT	Arrivals on runway 08. The second example picture was taken from here, too, but the A400 was training and pulled up again before reaching the end of runway 08/26.
TIME	In the summer light conditions are good from later morning till late afternoon and in the winter the whole day.
MISC.	Parking is limited, but possible by the roadside of “Bundesstrasse 442”. But park in “a nice way”, so you don’t block the whole farmroads! Everything you might need during spotting like restrooms or food/drinks can be found in the nearby village.
FOCAL LENGTH	70 – 300mm

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	Spot #3 – Fencekink – Runway 08 Arrivals + Line-Ups
WHERE	This spot is located just south of the 08/26 eastern end along the fence in the kink. Get rid of your car along the nearby roads (you may use the shown parking possibilities) and then take the pedestrians walkway across the field, but even before passing the runway axis, turn off to the right onto the field here in order to get to the mentioned fencekink, where you have a great view from.
WHAT	Arrivals and line-ups on runway 08 as well as heavy/late 26 departures.
TIME	In the summer light conditions are good from later morning till late afternoon and in the winter the whole day.
MISC.	Parking is limited, but possible by the roadside of “Bundesstrasse 442”. But park in “a nice way”, so you don’t block the whole farmroads! Everything you might need during spotting like restrooms or food/drinks can be found in the nearby village.
FOCAL LENGTH	50-150mm A400 (90 degree) = 80mm / A400 (face-to-face) = 95mm

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	Spot #4 – Heidorner Str. – 03 arrivals
WHERE	This spot is located by the roadside of “Heidorner Str.” and “B442” just next to a field. Parking is limited again and might be okay by the roadside, but (again) you won’t spent many hours here anyway.
WHAT	Arrivals on runway 03.
TIME	Light conditions are good from late midday (around 2 pm.) till sunset.
MISC.	Everything you might need during spotting like restrooms or food/drinks can be found in the nearby villages.
FOCAL LENGTH	We can’t provide no exact information at the moment, because the runway isn’t that often in use. But focal length should be like 70 – 300mm depending on the aircraft.

Unfortunately we can’t offer any example shots! Due to the rare movements on/at this runway we didn’t take any pictures.

	Spot #5 – Fence – 26 Line-ups
WHERE	This spot is no exact position rather the area along the fence and the field(s). This area is located by the fence next to a field or on the dirtpath, depending on your favourite angle. The spot can easily be reached from the cementery in Poggenhagen north of the runway. Park your car in the marked parking area and walk down the dirthpath to your favourite position – walk to the spot (which is marked on the map) takes ~5 minutes.
WHAT	This spot is used for 26 arrivals and Line-Ups, which normally look like the Casa one – the Transall only made a backtrack due to closed taxiways. Maybe you’ll be able to see “late vacators” from runway 08, too – we didn’t test those yet.
TIME	In the summer light conditions for Line-Ups (depending on the angle) are good from sunrise till early evening and in the winter the whole day – same should be said for “late vacators”. Arrivals should have good light from around 9am on in summer – in winter all day, too. In the summer evenings you can go up to the north to photograph the arrivals on 26 as well as the line ups.
MISC.	Everything you might need during spotting like restrooms or food/drinks can be found in the nearby villages, nothing really near the spot! Don’t drive in the paths, where signs says clearly, that their Usage is forbidden, around the runwayend! Ladder needed!
FOCAL LENGTH	South: Depending on your exact position, but around 70-300mm. North: C-130: 300mm; A400 54+18: 135mm; A400 54+24: 105mm

South Side:

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ETNW-Spot5 South Side

ETNW-Spot5 South Side

ETNW-Spot5 South Side

North Side:

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