SHOOTING ON BASE-Gilze-Rijen 7ties, 8ties...

[GerritsFinest]

Shooting on the flightline opposite the 316 hangar 410 was, as you can understand, not done! The maintenance chiefs had their office face the flightline… on the west side the squadron commander had an excellent view on his aircraft from behind his desk… sometimes aircraft were parked near the westerly entrance of the hangar, so staying out of sight. During the quiet hours act ‘as if you belong there’, walk by at the correct 50mm distance and make the shots quickly ‘from the raincoat’…! That took always some time you know, manual focus!

[GerritsFinest]

The visitors for January 1974 were:
03-01-1974 Belgium SF260 ST22 and ST24, after that it stayed, besides the local traffic, very quiet
28-01-1974 AT16ND ex B-59 was now seen at the flying club in all yellow and PH-KLU in blue, fuselage of the S11 E-13/6204 and parts of E-2, E-12 and E-30
29-01-1974 F104G D-6695 and practice approaches of the Atlantic 252 V
30-01-1974 F104G FX48 and FX69, T33’s FT02, FT03, FT06 in bare metal ex KLu M-44, ALO2 A27 BAR, ALO3 A-343. F104’s belonged to 1e Wing Beavechain, the T-birds were parked beginning rwy20!

[GerritsFinest]

and the Starfighters:

[Stefan]

Great stuff! Keep it coming please!!

Regards,
Stefan

[Flyboy]

[Jonathan]

Thanks for taking us back to 1974 this time! Great pics Gerrit!
I look forward to more of these!
Jonathan

[Soesterberg1954]

Hi Gerrit very nice pictures bringing back old memories

[Key]

That Belgian camo is still one of the best liveries ever, IMHO. Thanks again!

Erik

[edit: typo - thx Ben]

[GerritsFinest]

The good end of January did not mean that visitors were banging the Gilze’s door in February, on the contrary… But suddenly there was that flightplan of two Eggebeck Navy F104’s (26+83 and 26+84) that planned a visit to the base. A week before the date (22-2) everyone was informed, as this was a normal task of the Base Ops. That included Wing Ops, MP and Customs. De MP checked the passports, and Customs was interested in ‘how many cargo the Starfighter would bring’, they didn’t have the foggiest idea about the difference between a Friendship and a F104! But… the 19th of February a similar F104 from Eggebeck crashed near the island of Terschelling (Jackpot range). The pilot was safe fortunately. So this incident was the reason the visit was cancelled. Good for us the Canadians were still present in Europe and rumours came in about a squadron rotation with 421Sq which would take place in summer! Also the numerous S11’s woke up after their winter sleep and were towed outside for engine checks. Honcoop Trading Company (HTC) from de village of Veen bought a lot of them for selling them to the civil market. Hangars doors were opened, so gave me the chance to peep inside, interesting developments showed up…
Logs for February-March 1974 I noted:
Friday 1 February 1974: Tracker 151 V and TF104G D5803 made several approaches.
Tuesday 26 February 1974: Neptune 213 V and Tracker 169 V touch and go’s, CF104 104815.
Wednesday 27 February 1974: Neptune 207 V surprisingly repainted in the old days paint scheme with white back and grey underside, for future use in Curacao, even Aviation News wrote about it…, ALO3 A254
Thursday 28 February 1974: ALO3 A227 and Navy Atlantic 255 V for training
Monday 4 March 1974: F27 C8 camo
Tuesday 12 March 1974: S11’s: PH-ANK (6274 ex E31) left for Seppe. PH-DMA (6276 ex E33/176K) was standing outside. Inside the hangar were: PH-GAF (6277 ex E34) still wearing 177! PH-GAJ still E-20 (6211)! PH-GAP(6279 ex E36) still 179! PH-GAZ (6280 ex E37) still 197! The registrations PH-GAJ/GAP/GAZ were never allocated to these aircraft and might be wrongly painted on these S11's!! This discovery is not known to the aviation historians, now it is!
Thursday 21 March 1974: DHC6 Beavers S-4 and S-6 were withdrawn from further use KLu.
Friday 22 March 1974: ALO3 A489 and F27 C-2
Tuesday 26 March 1974: The civil regs of PH-GAJ/GAP/GAZ had been removed in the meantime, still standing in the hangar. The PH-GAF now without 177. Visitor ALO2 7775 GAR.
Wednesday 27-3-1974: F27 C-3 brought 316Sq to Schleswich via a stop at Twenthe. EHGR’s runway needed intensive repairs for a tooo long time! The next day the C3 returned (including myself…) A lot of Navy MFG1 Staffs were noted over there, wow!
Friday 29 March 1974: The unfortunate K3071 now painted as NAC-7 was seen on the ramp. On the port side the Flying =censored= Duck badge was seen. It underwent provisional repairs and started a second life as instructional airframe.

[Soesterberg1954]

Gerrit can only say amazing again luv the old stuff

[GerritsFinest]

From beginning of March till the 9th of May 316 Sq moved with 18 aircraft to Schleswich due to runway repairs on the homebase. To kill some time for me during this period it was easy to fly along the F27’s and Alo3 visitors and not to forget the flying club! In the early days of the club with only one small hangar on the south side of the base, having a few interesting aircraft like Harvard PHBKT camo and the PHKLU in very light lemon paint scheme and light blue lettering. Twin Comanche PHGAS was used for business trips by mr Jack Thuring to visit his clients in Western-Europe because he owned the large metal furniture factory Galvanitas in Oosterhout. Sometimes in the evening a quick fuel trip to Antwerp because the fuel was very cheap over there! Being an ex KLu pilot from the Meteor era he was a very skilled pilot, it was a delight to fly with him. Also mr Van Kemenade was a prominent pilot in the club those days, crazy about the Harvard of course… The strange S11 E13/E4 was dumped near the hangar, maybe used during the carnival parade?
Not much visitors to be mentionend:
3-3-1974 : Pipers R170 and R135 with black regies
16-3-1974: F27 C4 cam to EDCS nice trip 96 mins, back to Soesterberg 61 mins
17-3-1974: F27 C11 cam from Soesterberg back 19 mins
19-4-1974: Alo 3 A407 Sberg gilze 24 mins, F27 C12 white back home 13 mins
24-4-1974: Harvard PHBKT with Thuring to Eelde 63 mins, back 51 mins…

[Soesterberg1954]

Thnks Gerrit very nice

[GerritsFinest]

Enough time to peep into the S11 hangar when it was open occasionally, I was surprised to find some of them turned into civil Belgium aircraft still with their previous mil registrations. Also another Beaver came to its final KLu rest and also the curtain felt for some Pipers. The atmosphere was like a National Park during the absence of the jets… but far a away many J79 were starting up… Danish, German and last but certainly not least Canadian. 421SQ from Baden-Sollingen (EDAL) came over for a squadron rotation till Juin 11. That’s how an operation airbase should look like. Stunning welcome/goodbye and all in between parties were held in the evenings, the jets were back , the base was humming again! But the nearby population was not...
2 May 1974: S11’s OO-LMS 178 (6274), OO-MCH E-17 (6208) and OO-PCH E-1 (6199) in hangar
3May 1974: F27 C-11
8 May 1974: Alo-3 A-452
10 May 1974: DHC-6 Beaver S-8 wfu KLu as well as L21’s R130 and R156
16 May 1974: F27 C-5
17 May 1974: TF104G’s KLu D-5801, D-5803, D-5807, D-5811
20 May 1974: Atlantic 253 V approaches
21May 1974: Atlantic 258 V appr, Alo-3 H-81 Rescue
27 May 1974: RDAF CF104 R-700, R-702 the latter had an EC10 Mir3C Creil badge on the tail (parked beginning rwy 02), CAF CT133 133069, 133393, CF104’s: 104751,104785,104827,104839,104843,104866,104873,104892 CF104D 104661

[GerritsFinest]

and some more...

[GerritsFinest]

More visitors for May 1974:
29 May 1974: Alo-3 A236
30 May 1974: F104G D6652 322SQ, CC109 109159 412Sq
31 May 1974: CF104 104866 left rotation