Leipzig has grown into one of Germany (and Europe’s) largest cargo airports. It is the main hub on the continent for DHL Airways and their various subsidiaries and partners, allowing them a central location to receive, process and send on packages from around the world.

Aside from cargo, Leipzig is a moderately busy airport for passenger services, with around 2.3 million passengers passing through each year on domestic, intra-European, and holiday flights.

But naturally the vast majority of movements are those affiliated with DHL, and cargo carriers such as Bluebird, Swiftair, Kalitta, Europe Air Post, Air Atlantique, ABX, RAF Avia, Aerologic, Aviastar etc. This sees a lot of A300, B737, B757, and B777 types, but most interestingly also a lot of AN-12, AN-26 and TU-204 aircraft operating from countries to the east.

Cargo movements are largely between 10pm and 2am, but some operate during the day and it’s often possible to see many aircraft parked up during the day.

Spotting
The best place to spot at Leipzig is the viewing terrace atop the Administration Building next to the terminal. The outdoor terrace is open 24 hours a day, making it ideal for catching those nighttime movements (if a little chilly in winter!). It costs €2.

You can also get good views from the top of the car park.

Hotel
If you want to watch the cargo movements from the comfort of your warm hotel room (with SBS or Flightradar24), try the Globana Airport Hotel. It has rooms facing the airport, but some have restricted views.

Elsewhere
Whilst in Leipzig, remember to look out for the former Interflug IL-18 and TU-134 aircraft at the airport, which are easily seen from the viewing deck. There’s also an IL-62 in the city used as a cafe, and an IL-18 at one of the city’s museums.

DHL Timetable
You can download a handy DHL flight timetable from this link.

Credit goes to Mark Allday for the information in this article.

To mark the start of international scheduled services this week by ANA’s Boeing 787, I thought I’d mention a few other places you’ll be seeing the type this year. We’ll see a lot more Boeing 787 Dreamliners in our skies this year as more are delivered to airlines such as Air India, Japan Airlines and China Southern, so it’s time to start getting them in your logbooks!

Tokyo Haneda & Narita
With both ANA and JAL operating the Dreamliner this year, one of the best places to catch the type is at their Tokyo Narita and Haneda bases. This seems likely to be the place to catch the biggest concentration of Dreamliners outside of Seattle or Charleston this year.

Frankfurt International
For Europe, Frankfurt is the first place to see 787 operations with ANA from Tokyo. This was the type’s first international destination, and will be flying in every day.

Seattle
OK, so there are a few Seattle airports to see Deamliners. Most notably, Boeing’s Everett facility is the place where they’re put together. So you’ll see them quite regularly on flight test and out on the flight line. This includes the demonstrators, which is quite cool. However, ANA have also announced 787 flights to Seattle-Tacoma Airport from Tokyo, starting soon.

Boston
The US East Coast gets its first Dreamliner service from Japan Airlines in April, with non-stop service to Tokyo Narita.

Singapore
From September, Japan Airlines’ flights from Tokyo Narita will switch to 787s, increasing to 14x weekly by the end of October.

Melbourne
From October, Air India is expected to begin sending its 787s to Melbourne from its Indian bases. This will likely mark the first scheduled Dreamliner services to Australia.

Osaka Itami
Again, ANA sends its 787s to Itami. Maybe we’ll see more routes out of Osaka’s Kansai airport in the future, but for now the domestic one is the place to be.

New Delhi
Japan Airlines will start daily 787 flights to Delhi from Tokyo Narita later this year. However, if Air India receive their 787s on time, the airport is likely to get even more of the type in residence.

Moscow Domodedovo
Japan Airlines will send their Dreamliners to Moscow DME this year, replacing their 777 equipment. This sees the second known destination in Europe for the type.

Guangzhou
Despite heavy delays, China Southern are expected to take delivery of their first 787 before the Autumn. Therefore their home base of Guangzhou will become a hub for the type very soon.

There are of course more airports that the 787 flies to, such as domestic destinations within Japan. And as new frames arrive for Air India and China Southern, new routes will be announced. If you hear of any, let me know.

Check out this cool time-lapse video from Frankfurt Airport!

Frankfurt Airport Time Lapse Video

Frankfurt is one of the world’s busiest airports, yet they still think of the enthusiast and people who are interested in how an airport runs.
Their airside tours have been running for many, many years. They used to operate from the Terminal 1 viewing deck (remember the DC-8 nose section where the tour started? It’s still there by the way).

Today, you can still take a tour at one of the set times between 11am and 4pm. It costs €8 for adults and lasts around 45 minutes. It will take you on a bus tour of airside areas, including Terminal 1, Terminal 2, maintenance areas and taxiways.

To take the tour, head for the Frankfurt Airport Centre in the corridor between Terminals 1 and 2. Follow signs for the Airport Experience Tour. Here’s the link to the official information page

When Berlin’s new Brandenburg Airport opens on 3rd June 2012, it will be blessed with 29 new routes from national carrier Lufthansa – a clear sign that the airport will bring about a new era for air travel to the city.

Today, Lufthansa’s network to Berlin Tegel Airport is limited to domestic and a few European services. However, when the airline moves to the new airport on its opening day, it will introduce 130 new flights each week. New destinations include:

Ryanair surprised a few people today by announcing a new base is to be set up at Karlsruhe Baden-Baden airport in Germany. This will be their 47th base, and their 4th in Germany, but it comes after they made a big fuss about the German government’s imposition of passenger taxes and threatened to pull out many routes.

Ryanair already serve 12 destinations from the airport, so the addition of seven more routes and two dedicated Boeing 737-800 aircraft based there is not going to cause too much to shout about for the spotter. But it is nevertheless good news for the airport, which is currently Germany’s 18th largest.

The new base will take effect from March 2012. The new destinations are: Faro, Malaga, Palma, Riga, Thessaloniki, Vilnius and Zadar.

What do you think of this news?

Today, 21st October 2011, is the day Frankfurt/Main Airport opens its new 4th runway to operations.

The project has seen the new 25R/07L and its associated taxiways built with German precision and efficiency to the north-west of the airfield. It is shorter than the other runways at the airport, and will be used mainly for commuter and smaller airliner arrivals to ease pressure on the other runways.

This will make things a little more interesting for the spotter, and no doubt it will bring about some new places to spot from as enthusiasts explore.

The previous runway 25R/07L is now designated 25C/07C.

If you’re at Frankfurt any time soon, let us know what it’s like with the new runway in operation.

And if you’re a member of the UK Government – look, a 4th runway at a major airport. Opened with very little trouble or opposition. Why can’t we do the same for our busy hubs?

Details have been announced about the opening of the brand new Berlin Brandenburg Airport in Germany.

The airport will open its doors to scheduled services on 3 June 2012.

Initially, airlines such as airBaltic, Austrian Airlines, Lufthansa, Spanair and Swiss will be moving across from Tegel Airport which is to close in 2012, and also airlines from Schonefeld Airport (which is on the same site as the new Brandenburg Airport)

Routes are starting to appear in GDS for the new airport, so this will give you an idea of what operations will be like. Brandenburg promises to be the most modern airport in Europe when opened, and is certainly looking good from the photos I’ve seen.

I wonder what it will be like for spotting.

With the planned entry to service of ANA (and the world’s) first Boeing 787 aircraft, they have now announced details of what routes the aircraft will fly on initially. Here’s some details (thanks to the excellent Airlineroute.net blog):

The first commercial route will be a charter from Tokyo Narita to Hong Kong on 26 October 2011, returning on 27 October.

Scheduled domestic services will start between Tokyo Haneda and Okayama on 1 November, followed by Haneda to Hiroshima.

Scheduled international services will be flown between Tokyo Haneda – Beijing 1x weekly from December 2011, and Tokyo Haneda – Frankfurt 3x weekly from January 2012 (daily from February 2012).

So it seems Haneda is initially the place to go and see the aircraft, but European spotters will be delighted at the regular services into Frankfurt from early next year. This flight will arrive around 0525 and depart 1115 each morning.

Approval is being sought for a third runway at Munich Airport in Germany. The necessary requests have been made and the plan itself approved by the relevant authorities. Now it will go through all of the planning proceedings, where objections are likely to be raised.

The new runway will be parallel to the existing two, situated to the north. It will allow the airport – already the second busiest in Germany – to expand further and reduce congestion. For travellers in southern Germany as well as parts of Austria, France and Switzerland, Munich is a vital resource away from Frankfurt and Lufthansa has realised this by steadily growing its route network.

Local industry is naturally pleased with the plans, but local residents face extra noise and pollution, as well as loss of land.