There were eight participants for this trip. On Sunday 24 April 2022, 4 people gathered early at Schiphol at the meeting point and we would meet the other 4 people at LAX airport. After a successful flight we picked up the rental cars and drove to El Centro where we spent the first night. After a good night’s sleep, we started at MCAS Yuma on April 25, 2022. We had no visitors here, but the exercise Weapons Tactics Instructor 22 had just ended and a large number of aircraft could be logged and a number of departing aircraft could be photographed. There was also quite a bit of transport that was good to photograph. On that day, VMFA-242 “Bats” also departed from Yuma, which recently received brand new F-35Bs. As tanker support they were accompanied by two Air Force KC-10 Extenders. There was also an RAF Atlas that dropped some paratroopers on the Yuma proving grounds.
In the afternoon we drove to El Centro. In addition to a large number of T-45C Goshawks in the circuit, there was also a C-2A Greyhound making approaches. We watched the activities from outside the fence in the afternoon and at 4:00 pm we drove back to our hotel via, an unfortunately empty, El Centro Imperial Airport.
