Wels airfield

Wels Airfield lies just north of the city of Wels in Upper Austria. It sits beside the wide Salzach plain where the Traun and Alm rivers meet. The airfield is not a passenger hub but a working base for business flights and private pilots. Military training aircraft practise circuits here each weekday morning. Ambulance helicopters lift patients to hospitals in Linz and Salzburg when needed. The control tower keeps watch over light aircraft that come and go all through the day. The airfield has no grand terminal or long runways. Instead it has a single grass strip and a tarmac apron where small jets and helicopters park. Business travellers land for meetings in Wels or to reach other parts of Upper Austria quickly. Private owners keep their planes here because hangar space is cheaper than at Vienna or Graz. The control tower, built in the 1970s, still directs every take-off and landing with a small team of controllers. Visitors can walk along the perimeter fence and watch the aircraft manoeuvre. On clear days the Alps rise to the south while the Bohemian Forest looms to the north. The airfield’s café serves coffee and cakes to pilots and guests. A small aviation museum displays historic gliders and trainers from the 1950s. The grass strip turns golden in summer, and the scent of meadow grass mixes with the smell of aviation fuel.