Düsseldorf – Spotting Around the Airport

With my trip to Düsseldorf being mainly a rail based one, I had a yearning for some Avgeekery and, with Germany’s fourth busiest airport just a few stops from the city centre, I decided to spend the morning of the final day of my trip spotting at Düsseldorf airport. For those wanting to read about the city of Düsseldorf itself and any non-transport things I got up to, don’t worry, that blog is coming next week. You can also catch up on my journey to Düsseldorf via Brussels here and here.

Headquarters of Lufthansa’s low cost subsidiary Eurowings and a base for a number of other airlines including Condor, Corendon, SunExpress and TUI fly Deutschland, Düsseldorf handled almost 20 million passengers in 2023. Almost 20% (3.75m) of these passengers were heading to one of three destinations, Palma de Mallorca, Antalya or Istanbul (IST), with another half a million destined for Istanbul (SAW), showing the importance of the connections to Turkey to the airport. In total 70 airlines serve 200 destinations in 55 countries, with there being the usual mix of European major airlines as well as some more interesting ones such as MEA and Matla Air.

In terms of aircraft, the vast majority of flights at Düsseldorf are operated with the Airbus A320 family (A319/A320/A321s) or Boeing 737 variants, however there are some smaller Airbus A220s, Embraer E-Jets and CRJs operating for airlines such as AirBaltic, Helvetic, LOT and SAS. With Düsseldorf also having connections to the Middle East, if your visit to the airport is timed correctly, you’ll also get to see the wide bodies operated by Emirates, Qatar and Turkish Airlines. I think the biggest surprise turning up to spot at Düsseldorf without doing any research was the large number of Turkish airlines, including Turkish Airlines itself as well as Corendon, SunExpress, Mavi Gök and Pegasus.

During my visit to Düsseldorf I visited two different spotting spots, with the first being outside the mainline Düsseldorf Airport Station (n.b. this is different to Düsseldorf Airport Terminal Station that is served by the S-bahn only). By heading down to the street level exit from the station, you can then either spot through the fence from street level, or head up the emergency exit stairs at the end of the SkyTrain platforms to spot over the fence. Unfortunately, the main issue with this spot is that it has limited opportunities for photos unless you have a long-range lens due to the distance from the actual aircraft.

This spot is close to the hangar where the local Police helicopters are based and so I was able to get some decent photos of these, and you can see the maintenance apron, aircraft using runway 23L and any aircraft taxiing to this runway or runway 23R. In terms of facilities, the station has toilets inside, however any other facilities such as shops or food outlets are at the airport terminal itself. In the end I didn’t spend very long at this spot due to the distance from the aircraft and so headed inside to jump on the SkyTrain to the terminal and spot number 2.

Spotting spot number 2 was the airport’s Car Park 7, which can be accessed by foot from the northern end of the terminal building. Obviously as a car park there aren’t any facilities other than parking, however its just a few minutes’ walk back to the terminal where there are plenty of facilities. The top floor of the airport is open-air with limited shelter, and so if its raining, the floor below might be a better spot to head to. The end of the car park closest to the terminal provides excellent views of stands A01-A08, whilst at the far end you can see the maintenance area and thresholds of runways 23L and 23R, however these are blocked slightly by various airport buildings.

This was great spot for seeing everything taxiing for departure, taking off from the active runway 23L as well as anything using stands A01-A08. The latter included SAS, AirBaltic, Eurowings, LOT, Helvetic and Lufthansa and I was able to get an excellent view of Eurowings’ special Europa Park liveried Airbus A320. The only downside to this spot was that there was a bit of distance between it and the main taxiway, meaning a long range lens would have been ideal, however my phone camera still made a good go of catching the passing aircraft that had been parked elsewhere.

I really enjoyed my time spotting at Düsseldorf Airport, with there being a good variety of airlines and aircraft to keep things interesting. Both spots are easy to get to, although Car Park 7 was definitely the better of the two options as you are closer to the action. It also has the benefit of being just a few minutes’ walk from the terminal and all its facilities. If you’re in Düsseldorf then a trip to spot at the airport is an easy ‘side quest’ although since the closure of the viewing terrace during Covid 19, I wouldn’t make a special trip in the same way I would to Amsterdam.

Viewing location                    2*

Charge (free)                       5*

Facilities                          1*

Variety of Traffic                  4*

DUS (Station) Overall Score        3*

Viewing location                   4*

Charge (free)                       5*

Facilities                          4*

Variety of Traffic                 4*

DUS (Car Park 7) Overall Score     4.25*