Aircraft: Gulfstream IV, V-11 Photographer: J. van Boven Place: Eindhoven Date: 19980627 Copyright ©: Sentry Aviation News

Aircraft: Fokker 50, U-06 Photographer: J. van Boven Place: Eindhoven Date: 19980627 Copyright ©: Sentry Aviation News

Background information

Northwest of the city Eindhoven in the Netherlands is the base Eindhoven of the Royal Dutch Air force (Klu) located.

During the years, the Eindhoven base evolved to a mixed civil an military airport with many national and international airlines under the operational authority of the Dutch Air force. Nearby industrial companies like Philips and Daf were responsible for the growth of the civil part of Eindhoven air base.

The first Dutch military jets arrived at Eindhoven in 1952. In 1994, the last F-16 of 314 squadron left Eindhoven. By that time,  the Dutch military transport squadron 334, was already present with its Fokker F 27 transport aircraft. Due to the upcoming retirement of the F 27's, the changed military balances after the end of the Cold War and the new world wide peace keeping tasks of the Dutch military forces, the Dutch air force needed aircraft with other requirements.

The cargo transporting task of the F 27 is now performed by four Fokker F 60 Utility (U-01, U-02, U-03 and U-04). The Fokker 60 Utility is a stretched version of the Fokker 50. The F 60 is used for transport of cargo and passengers.

As a replacement for the  VIP transporting task of the F 27, 2 Fokker 50's are used (U-05, U-06). The F 50's resemble most to the Fokker 50 used by many civil airlines.

One special VIP jet, a Gulfstream IV (V-11), is used for fast long distance VIP transport. This plane is used very often by the Dutch government which means that most missions are flown to and from Dutch Naval Air Station Valkenburg, located close to the Den Haag were the government resides.

Another new aircraft type in the inventory of the Klu are two Lockheed C-130 Hercules (G-275,G-273). This aircraft was chosen for it's capacity to operate from normal airfields as from unprepared airstrips on humanitarian missions. The training of pilots and mechanics is performed in close cooperation with the Hercules squadron of the Belgium Air Force based at Brussels.

The 'strangest' aircraft of 334 squadron is the KDC-10 (T-235,T-264). Besides a transporting aircraft, it is also an air-to-air refueling aircraft. Air-to-air refueling is a task that was never performed by the Dutch Air force. If the F-16 pilots needed to train air-to-air refueling, tanker capacity from the USAF was used. The KDC-10 is not a standard KC-10 as used by the USAF. It is a converted civil DC-10. For refueling purposes, a boom is fitted to the DC-10. In contrary to boom operators ("boomers") in USAF aircraft, the boomer in a KDC-10 is not located in the tail of the aircraft. The boomer sits close to the pilots in front of the aircraft. With camera's, monitors and special 3 dimension glasses, the boomer is able to operate the boom from a distance.

On Saturday 27th of June 1998, a Press day/Spotters day was organized at Eindhoven. Except for the Fokker 60's U-01, U-02 and U-03 all aircraft were placed at the tarmac of 334 sq. All photo's in this article were taken at this day.

Credits: PRO Eindhoven Air base (Internet http://www.iaehv.nl/users/buvo).