The following day, Wednesday 17 April, day our bus took us to Andravida for the second Iniochos spottersday. Initially the weather forecast looked not to good for this day but beside some clouds mid-day it turned out to be a great day with a lot of sun! The registration process went smoothly and after a little while we were in the grass along the runway awaiting the first take offs. The first large wave consisted of a considerable number of Greek F-16s which were followed by Greek, Qatari and French Rafales, four Greek Mirage 2000s and two Spanish Hornets. An awesome start of the day! Just when the group was starting to transfer to the afternoon spot the great sound of four Phantoms was heard which took the air shortly afterwards along with some additional Greek F-16s and four Saudi Typhoons. After these aircraft had recovered we had to wait a little while for the third wave of the day. This time two Romanian F-16s, a couple of Saudi Typhoons, Spanish Hornets and a number of Greek F-16s took to the air. The absolute cherry on the cake were two Phantoms which diverted the day prior to our visit. They arrived in glorious weather and great pictures could be taken when they taxied back to their shelters. All in all it was a great day again thanks to the hospitality of the Hellenic Air Force with great food and cold drinks available for more than reasonable prices and an extremely relaxed atmosphere. With Andravida being the future F-35 base it is expected that the base will be undergoing some construction work in the future which might affect the Iniochos exercises but we surely hope to be back again one more time in 2025.
