Okay, it has come to light that it probably wasn’t KLM but the board of directors of the Holland Aviation House (shotgun marriage between Aviodrome and Dutch Dakota Association, with KLM firmly in the saddle as well…) themselves who rather late in the day got “cold feet”. :rolleyes:
See Ralph Pettersen’s http://www.conniesurvivors.com/1-connie_news.htm#MAY22 for some more interesting details.
Before blasting off mails towards veteran Aviodome spokesperson P.v.d.N: it certainly wasn’t his decision!
It is the board you should point your anger at… :diablo:
ALSO:
The following was taken from a “Constellation update newsletter” which was sent to “premium money donors” this Friday afternoon at 17.00 hrs Central European Time:
Op internet staan enkele geruchten dat de Connie niet zou gaan vliegen, maar, zoals u zich kunt voorstellen, vergt het vliegen met de Constellation de nodige voorbereidingen en dienen we met alle betrokkenen goede afspraken te maken. In dat proces zitten we nu.
Above text in Dutch can loosely be translated to:
“on the internet some rumours can be found stating that the Connie will not be flying. As you can understand flying with the Constellation requires a lot of preparations and we have to make arrangements with all parties concerned. We are currently in that process of making arrangements.”
As you can see this last-minute decision by the board is not denied…
And so far no official announcement from the boardmembers themselves.
By: avion ancien - 23rd May 2009 at 18:03
Not a good time for Constellations, methinks – what with this one and F-BGNL at Nantes failing to find favour with the powers that be. Maybe PierrePapy can update us on the position of F-BGNL?
By: warhawk69 - 23rd May 2009 at 14:51
Above text in Dutch can loosely be translated to:
“on the internet some rumours can be found stating that the Connie will not be flying. As you can understand flying with the Constellation requires a lot of preparations and we have to make arrangements with all parties concerned. We are currently in that process of making arrangements.”
Just thought I would let you know,the Connie has been removed from the Waddington Airshow list.
Phill
www.outflankeduk.com
By: Stratofreighter - 23rd May 2009 at 13:24
It very likely isn’t financially…
Officially at least KLM is not “the main financial sponsor” of this project.
Last year a rather high-profile “donate for the Constellation” programme was set up. Hundreds of people donated one hundred euros (was about 70 GBP back then…) or more to become a “VIP-member”, plus thousands putting in lesser amounts of money.
The following of “Dutch Connie” has been rather strong with people and (small) companies supporting her over the years, whether in kind/natura or guilders/euros.
Also huge charity/lottery funds could be obtained last year, and these funds will flow in between now and about 2013-is. Even without KLM’s support the Constellation would now be “financially independent”, at least for this year.
This decision has all the hallmarks of “being afraid of one’s corporate image” and concerns for “liability”.
People are mostly angry about the timing of this decision, plus the fact that people donating money and CERTAINLY all those hardworking volunteers were suddenly faced with this decision, without any explanation at all.
The volunteers, a lot of whom have been working on N749NL from about 2000/2001, feel they’ve been betrayed by “the board”… 😡
By: Joe Petroni - 23rd May 2009 at 12:45
If KLM are anything to do with financing the project then I think this is fairly understandable given the huge losses Air France / KLM are making at the moment.
Sign In
May 23, 2009 at 12:13 pm