Karlsruhe-Forchheim

48°58'58"N 008°20'03"E

runway: 03/21 - 950x30m - asphalt

Karlsruhe-Forchheim airfield (German: Flugplatz Karlsruhe-Forchheim, ICAO: EDTK) was an airfield 525 kilometers southwest of Berlin.
The airfield on the Forchheimer millitary training area was first used as such in 1909 by aircraft constructor Franz Sydov, who's first atempts to fly took him to an altitude of 6 meters (just under 20 feet). Aviation pioneer Paul Senge from Hagenau (then a German city) began using the field from April 1910. His small leaps became true flights and it did not take long before he could fly around the field. Togeteher with his friend Lamprecht he built a new aircraft, which took him to 100 meters and a figure 8 flight. He crashed on 6 September 1911 late in the afternoon. While he was unconsciously taken to a hospital in Karlsruhe by car, local youth began stripping the wreck for souvenirs. Paul recovered, built new aircraft and flew up to 26 minutes in Karlsruhe. In September 1913, while taking part in an air race, he had to make an emergency landing northwest of Cologne, near Grevenbroich. Unable to find a suitable field, he crashed and this time he did not survive. He was buried in Hagenau with many aviation friend from Karlsruhe, having reached only 23 years of age. Paul Senge's grave is tended to by the Flugsportverein Karlsruhe (aviation sports club Karlsruhe) to this day.
With Senge's death, the exercise area was no longer used for flight. Instead, Karlsruhe began using an airfield north of the city from the 1920s.


Paul Senge during an attempted flight at the exercise area in 1910 (photo Stadtarchiv Karlsruhe)

In 1957 a new airfield was opened at the former exercise area, although a glider airfield already was in existence since 1954. The festivities centered around a Flying Day, which was held on 22 September 1957. The airfield soon began to grow and by 20 January 1959 the airfield was assigned its own radio frequency. in the summer of that year, the airfield became part of regular air traffic when air taxis began offering their services. A year later the airfield had a 4 times per week scheduled connection to Düsseldorf. A large airfest was held in October 1960.
The German operator "Deutsche Taxiflug" maintained a service Baden Baden-Oos - Karlsruhe - Mannheim - Frankfurt/Main in 1961 under flight number TF30 with a Do-28. The return flight in the evening was flight number TF31. The German Bundeswehr (federal armed forces) became frequent user of the airfield for parachutist training from a Luftwaffe Noratlas from 1962.
Plans for a 1000m hardened runway in 1964 prompted the first objections from local inhabitants. They were all rejected by the Karlsruhe city council however. In August 1965 construction of a new 1000m/30tonne-class runway to replace the old grass runway was approved. Additionally, the airport was granted permission to build more hangar space. In return, the city promised to connect the burrough of Forchheim to the city's water supply system (sidenote: the connection that was made back then, continues to supply the burrough with fresh drinking water to this day). A flying day was held the following month, during which Lufthansa Boeing 727-100 D-ABCI "Karlsruhe" made two fly-bys: one a 'dirty' pass (slow flight with all wheels and flaps extended) and a fast 800KM/h low pass. Construction of a 950x30m runway, with an approved landing weight of 5,6tonne (or occasional 20tonne with special permits) began the day after the flying day.

During the June 1966 Flying Day, a Luftwaffe Noratlas became the first 'heavy' to land on the newly completed and accepted runway. Three civilian registered Fouga Magister CM170Rs were donated to the Karlsruhe "Aviation Association of Reservists of the German Bundeswehr" (german: "Luftfahrtverein der Reservisten der Deutschen Bundeswehr e.V."). Aside from training about 20 private pilots (at their own expense), they also took part in about a thousand Flying Days in Germany and Switzerland. One of the pilots flying the Magister at Karlsruhe was Dr. Manfred Wörner, reserve officer of the Luftwaffe, later Defense minister of Germany and the seventh Secretary General of NATO from 1988 until his death in 1994. The aviation association was dissolved in 1971 and the aircraft returned to the Bundeswehr.
In 1969, Karlsruhe-Forchheim ranked first in Baden-Würtemberg and fourth in Germany on the list of regional airports. In 1971 reached overe 93,000 movements and in September 1975 the first Rescue helicopter (a Bell-206) was stationed at the airfield. In October 1977 the local papers reported the organisation had already proved its worth in 1000 missions, but only a few days later the helicopter (Bell-206L D-HDRF) hit a high tension wire in dense fog while on approach to the airfield. In the resulting explosion the crew of three perished.

In 1980, the airfield received a new control tower, handling station and fuel station. In 1991 the airfield became the final objective for the "Deutschlandflug 1991", the first such flight tour since 1938  to go through all of Germany (since World War 2 prohibited such flights and the Iron Curtain had divided the country). "Tante Ju", a 1936-built Junkers-52/3m registered D-AQUI in Lufthansa colours, was one of the participating aircraft. 


Arrival of 'Tante Ju'  (auntie Ju) at Karlsruhe in 1991.

In 1992 the municipality of Rheinstetten favoured the lengthening of the runway by another 470 meters on the south side. The Karlsruhe Municipal council however, had different plans. They favoured the takeover of CFB Baden-Söllingen, the Canadian air base that was to be vacated by Canada after the post-Cold War defense cuts were announced. In their plans, the airbase was to be redeveloped into a regional airfield, to be known as Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden. In the mean time, nothing was to be changed at Forchheim. Soon it became all too clear: Forcheim was to be closed in 2000, even though the airfield had attracted between 50 and 65 thousand movements annually in the first half of the 1990s, 15 to 22.5 thousand of those being commercial flights. annually, the airfield handled 90 to 112 thousand passengers. After the opening of Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden the amount of annual flights dropped sharply. The final years, the airfield held annual Flying Days, but nothing could be done to prevent closure. Karlsruhe had elected to close the airfield and replace it with the Karlsruhe Messe, an event and conference center. Forchheim closed on 30 September 2000 for motorised flights. The remaining grass runway 03/21 was kept as a "special airfield" (Gereman: Sonderlandeplatz) until the opening of the new glider airfield Rheinstetten. Rheinstetten was to serve as the new home for no less than 4 aviation clubs from Forchheim. 


The airfield only a few months before it was permanently closed. Judging from the number of aircraft still at the airfield, it was certainly a viable airfield (Google Earth).

The new Karlsruhe Messe, built at the airfield between 2001 and 2003, opened in October 2003. It covers nearly all of the former airfield, only the northern end of the former runway was still visible in 2013. After the first 10 years of its existence, the "Messe" project had yet to write black numbers in their books.


View of what remained of the airfiel din 2005. The four halls of the new center were clearly 'dropped' onto the airfield (Google Earth).


The north side of the runway was being incorporated into a golf course by 2011 (Google Earth)