In the first week of February 2021, very ‘wintery’ weather situations were recorded (in the Netherlands), with temperatures going down to -10 or even -15o Centigrade at night with some 10-20 cm of snow. The last time this kind of winter weather was seen in the Netherlands was about a decade ago. Because of the Corona/Covid travel-limitations plus arctic conditions, the Dutch Royal Air Force Helicopter Command (Koninklijke Luchtmacht Defensie Helikopter Commando) made use of this weather to perform some arctic training in the Netherlands instead of going on an artic deployment to Norway. During the warm summer months, the helicopter crews train for ‘brown-out’ landings in the sand, where the blown-up sand will hamper vision. Now there was the option to exercise the ‘white-out’ landing and take-off conditions where the vision was hampered by snow flying around. In the military low-lying area ‘GLV5’ near Eindhoven Air Base, several Eurocopter AS532 Cougar and Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopters had been exercising in the snow. The Cougar helicopters landed during end of the day, by last sunlight, while the Chinooks had landed during a sunny afternoon.
Photos and text: Joris van Boven and Alex van Noije