After enjoying a great breakfast buffet on Wednesday morning (18 June) the bus took us to the main gate of Konya. We were expected there at 8 o’clock, along with over 100 other photographers. The procedure and setting were comparable to last year; checking in and a very friendly approach by the Turkish Air Force. This was followed by a short briefing about the exercise and the opportunities. Anatolian Eagle 2014/2 had brought together an interesting list of participants. Apart from dozens of Turkish F-16s there were Turkish Phantoms, Spanish F-18s and Typhoons, RAF Typhoons, Jordanian F-16s and Mirage 2000s of Qatar. The briefing also gave information about what to expect the next days. Everybody was very content, all would be very ok. “Relax, we will be done with the briefing in time, so you will not miss any aircraft.”. Then we were taken to the runway, near the threshold. In full sunshine, nice temperatures and dozens of fighters that could be captured perfectly is was a great experience again. Again is showed that setting as little rules a possible gives the best result. Using common sense and some cooperation between those that were present it all went very smooth (let aside some smaller testosterone-moments, but these are normal, nothing special). After that we enjoyed a great lunch (for a couple of euros) and a repeat of things in the afternoon. Because the sun had moved we were brought to the other side of the runway. The resulted in different shots, even as spectacular as the ones from earlier in the day. After the second wave had returned we were brought to the main gate again and we said goodbye until the following morning. The evening in Konya was spent eating on a terrace by all.
