Sometimes it's just a matter of luck

On Sunday, all I could do was to track via Flightradar24 a Lockheed Martin CC-130J Super Hercules from Royal Canadian Airforce landing in NUE. Why? Because it landed after the sunset. So there was no point in trying to photograph it. I kept an eye on Flightradar24 for departure times, but no dice. So this Monday morning, I decided to take a bus to NUE, even though there was nothing in particular I wanted to photograph, and the weather was uninspiring at best.

I thought I'd walk to the Besucherhügel and try to capture whatever would fly my way. But because the bus was late, I opted to go up to the roof of the P3 parking building instead.

As soon as I was on the roof, I could hear the unmistakable sound of four turboprop engines, and — yay! — it was the Super Hercules slowly taxiing to the RWY 28 for take-off. I mean, talking about luck! Not only I managed to bag a good deal of photos: precisely because the weather was so gloomy, I manage to capture impressive vortices around the propellers.

Although I could have gone home after that, I had a thermos mug with hot coffee, a decent sandwich from Der Beck, and a couple of cookies the missus packed for me. So I walked to the Besucherhügel, where I had a nice lunch, interrupted only by photographing departing airplanes.