View

Sitting behind a big oval window and under the wing every Friendship passenger enjoys, from no matter which row of chairs, an unlimited view down. But because the plane stands so low on its legs on the ground the view is limited. That disadvantage played a part with the crew of a Norwegian Friendship during a landing in a blizzard at Stavanger Airport. Steenbergen spent some time there in the mid-sixties. 'The centre of the runway had been cleared of snow and the snow that had been pushed aside formed a wall between the landing planes and the runway lights in the shoulder. From the high flightdeck of most planes one could just look over the wall and keep an eye on the runway lights. But the Friendship pilots were sitting so much lower to the ground, that the runway lights disappeared behind the wall. Thus the crew of the plane in question got disoriented and drifted off the runway. And there they met with huge chunks of rock as there was construction going on because of the lengthening of a runway. The nosewheel was beaten back by the rocks and pushed the cockpit floor up, in between the pilots. The left main gear was ripped off and took the engine nacelle with it and now the wing between the fuselage and the engine broke off. No personal casualties happened but there was considerable physical damage. In short, quite a swarm of flies in the ointment of the technical representative. Steenbergen: ‘The replacement of outer wings we had done before, but nothing was written in our manual about replacement of the middle part.' So that was a challenge. For openers, the plane had to be transported by freight-train to Bergen, as there were more repair facilities available there. 'I did start to phone the Norwegian Railways so as to find out the clearances of the railway tunnels between Stavanger and Bergen. After six months the plane was airworthy again, and after the trial flight no complaints were lodged by the pilots. Even stronger, the plane flew 15 knots faster than before the crash'.

While Steenbergen was busy with this in the Norwegian snow, Nieuwenburg was acting as if he was at home, roughly ten thousand kilometers further South. He was in the right-hand cockpit-seat of a Sudanese Friendship, of which the first officer had gone to the rear to stretch his legs. They flew over Sudan en route to Khartoum. His view was limited as well, but that was because he - like the captain - was sitting low in his chair with the feet on the instument panel and 'was comfortably listening to the BBC'. Flying was delegated for the moment to the auto-pilot. The instruments showed the normal altitude and on the radar they could see the Nile. 'We just contemplated that by now we should slowly start to descend, when the first officer came into the cockpit and from where he was standing looked out of the windows. The scream he then let out really woke us. In disgust he looked at the thick layer of ice which was visible on the front window and which was the cause, that the instrument indications were not even close to the truth at all. We were a lot lower than the altimeter indicated and if the 'first' had come in a bit later we really would have flown 'into' Khartoum.

Lavatory stories

The capacity of the chemical toilet of one of the first F27 models was really limited. Thus Steenbergen had had his objections to the decision of a German customer, during a VIP flight, to have unlimited beer served. To add to this, they were flying 40 passengers instead of the usual 36. After the flight he was on board when the toilet truck pulled up. 'Together with the Viscount the Friendship were the last planes to be equipped with this 'tub-system'. The container of this toilet had to be lifted by hand out of the toilet and the man who did this subsequently had to walk backwards over a special canvas mat in order to leave the toilet space. Outside Steenbergen was observing the goings on when something went wrong, because of which the man in the cabin stumbled over the mat and spilled the contents of the container over himself. Luckily there was not much ‘Scheisse’ in it.

The overpressure in the Friendship cabin was used in the toilet for the effortless exhaustion of undesirable smells through the toiletpot. Little spacers under the toiletseat made sure that there was a gap between the seat and the toilet, so that the air-circulation was kept active. What was on a woman's mind when, on a flight to Cologne, she lifted the toiletseat and next sat down straight on the toiletpot has never been adequately explained. Her behind sealed the toilet and because of the airstream was tight as a rock. At a certain good moment she drew the attention of the flight crew to the toilet and communicate her problem, she was stuck and in panic. But the luck in her predicament was that Technical Representative Steenbergen himself was on board. The flight attendant got him from the flightdeck for emergency consultation. On his way to the place of mishap Steenbergen passed the pantry and instinctively grabbed a spoon, vaguely assuming that that might be the tool with which this complaint could be eliminated. The elimination itself he discretely left to a female member of the crew. The spoon was manoeuvered between the thigh and rim of the toilet, thus liberating the passenger from her awkward position.

A Member of the Board of a Scandinavian customer had gone to the toilet, not that long after take-off from Amsterdam, and thereupon had never re-appeared because of a defect in the locking mechanism of the toiletdoor. Not too long before the landing at destination (about two-and-a-half hours later) the Technical Representative - who at that time assisted in the role of steward - was stuck with an extra glass of cognac. A head-count was made and that number was compared to the list of passengers. Searching was done, discovery made and liberation occurred. But the excuses which accompanied that yet very good cognac elicited only one reaction: ‘You can go to hell’ (Drag åt helvete - 'go to hell' is one of the more coarser insults in the Scandinavian languages - transl.). Luckily the contracts had been signed by then.

Fokker bracket

After retiring Steenbergen decided not to occupy himself any more with the planes with which he had worked, but aim himself at the restoration of the really old planes, as the Fokker Spin ( = 'Spider' - the Spin was Tony Fokker's first plane in 1910 - transl.) 'I really appreciate what those constructors thought of way back when. Now take that Fokker bracket for example. That is kind of a little tube with a bolt through it. You can attach all kinds of things with it to a steel tube construction, of which those pre-war fuselages mainly consisted. It is really neat, that a modern version of that same bracket is used in the Friendship.'

Corpses in the crate

( the Dutch original text makes a play on words here: in Dutch slang a plane is called a 'crate', for coffin in Dutch the same word is used: kist - transl.) Nieuwenburg was stationed at the Balearic Islands, where Friendships maintained the routes between the islands. A deceased person had to be brought back to his island of birth in order to be buried and Nieuwenburg assisted with the loading of the cardboard coffin which was held together with some kind of staples. The coffin had to enter through a door where it then would fit exactly in the freight compartment opposite the pantry. The turn through the door was made with difficulty when the rear panel of the coffin came loose. Nieuwenburg: 'All of a sudden I got two grimy feet against my chest. I pushed them back and closed the coffin again, but not before the stewardess had had a peek in the coffin as well. That flight no-one had anything to drink, as the stewardesses did not dare enter the pantry again.

Steenbergen: ‘In the Sudan we once had to take a dead man along, who was only covered with some kind of a tarpaulin and was bound to a door. However, the man was taller than the door and consequently his head was sticking out. The whole had to be shoved under my seat, otherwise he would not fit in the passage way behind the cockpit. So when I looked down I saw between my legs that head. After arrival we had to wait for hours for Customs before we could unload that corpse. It was more than 40°C in that cockpit. I never forget that aroma'.

Spare parts

Steenbergen: If an important part is no longer locally available does that give rise to the situation ‘Aircraft on ground’. Fokker then guarantees that the part will be delivered within 24 hours, no matter where in the world. Especially in the beginning, when I was in Norway, was that not yet as smooth as nowadays. Telephone connections had to be established -with many difficulties - with Radio Scheveningen (a telephone service originally established for the merchant marine - transl.) And then it could happen during the week-end, that I would get the guard at the gate on the line, who with a curt ‘Factory closed’ then would replace the receiver. If I then called for the second time my first words would be ‘@#*&$!, don't bloody hang up!' The guard would then call somebody at home, who then would go to the plant, by bike, look for the part in the stockroom and then ship the part. During a flight from Göteborg to Amsterdam, when we had the Board of one of the customers on board, the automatic cabin pressure regulator failed. I had a phonecall made to the plant, via Schiphol Air Traffic Control, to make sure, that someone was there on our arrival with the part in question. And yes, there was our boss waiting for us, with the part under his arm. The trouble was then fixed within finve minutes, with the customer's Board present. We made a very good impression then.

The passenger

Steenbergen: 'The largest man in Germany had to be transported by Friendship. With a forklift they got him with difficulty throught the wide forward freight-door and he could sit down on two seats. But the seatbelts were too short. I then unscrewed the seatbelts from the folding seat in the cockpit and and tied them to the German's seatbelts. After that we were allowed to depart.

Nieuwenburg: ‘The neatest thing I found the foreign cultures that one came in contact with, especially the moslim countries. I like those people very much as I do like their stories. When you start to know them a bit better, are they very sociable people who will appreciate a joke, those veiled women as well. They are open, hospitable and friendly. Steenbergen: ‘The nicest thing is solving those problems. When that plane can go into service again, that gives satisfaction. Then I say to myself, We did it again and it is right.'

Ron Kolsteeg