Is there a good place to watch planes land in San Antonio? (Seguin: maintenance, fence)

[ajblogger]

I'd like to take my son to watch airplanes takeoff and/or land here in San Antonio. I'd preferably like the place to be free. Thanks!!

[alphagaiter]

Actually there is a spot in McAllister Park that takes some walking to get to, but the trail looks right onto the runways of the airport. From what I remember from running there, its part of the bigger loop (the 6 mile one), maybe 3 miles in? It's been awhile since I've run that way. But its definitely free

[SnappyBob]

Plenty of air fields around here. What's your pleasure? Big military cargo plains? Lackland. Fighter jets? Lackland or Randolph. Commercial jetliners and smaller crafts? San Antonio International Airport. Little Piper Cub type planes? Stinson Field. I'm not sure what kind of craft you might find coming in and out of Castroville. I used to have a friend who used that field for his Byplane. Others here can probably tell you more specific places to park where you can see the runway itself.

[majormadmax]

If you are looking for military hardware, it all depends on who's flying. Some days the north end of Kelly Field on Lackland can be a great place to sit and watch planes on approach. Just take the South Acme exit off of Highway 90 and park along Growdon Road. The Texas Air National Guard flies F-16 fighters, and the Air Force Reserve wing there flies the monstrous C-5 transport planes; plus a lot of other military iron flies through there considering the amount of contract maintenance going on there by several companies. And you just missed NASA 911 carrying the space shuttle a few weeks ago!

For Randolph, it has two parallel runways but Lower Seguin Road is probably your best bet. The western side runway usually accommodates the T-6 Texans, a prop trainer, and the eastern side the supersonic T-38s and larger T-1A and T-43 trainers.

For civil stuff, I would recommend Stinson Field on the southside as well. Hondo has a cool airport that was a USAAF training locations for navigators during WWII, but it doesn't appear to get much traffic these days. You can pretty much drive up to anywhere along the flightline fence there, so a location is of your choosing.

Cheers! M2

[heimerswt]

You could go park & loiter in the Megaplexxx parking lot at Nakoma/281, but that might send the wrong signal to the wrong person.

[Dopo]

Just go to the Shell gas station at Nakoma & 281
Shell at Nakoma & San Pedro (281)

In one of the pictures in GoogleMaps (facing South) you can see a plane that was landing
Shell at Nakoma & San Pedro (281) - Plane Landing (Takes a second to load the picture)

[Bo]

You've gotten a couple of recommendations to go west of 281. Many of the businesses on Nakoma, east of 281 have good views of the longest runway.

[rd2007]

I'll second the Kelly location. I can't imagine there is anywhere that lets you get THAT close to them. I parked there one time with my wife and daughter when a C-5 flew over and it scared the crap out of them, but in a good way. You can probably literally hit them with a rock, but please don't.

[StanStelle]

I've been meaning to photograph approaching C-5s for years. Do they usually fly a regular schedule at Kelly or is there an hour where I am likely to catch one?

[rd2007]

I do not think they would release the schedule for security reasons, but I see a lot of planes flying in all the time and I'm not 100% positive on whether or not it was a C-5. It was huge, had four engines, and about 30 tires.