In a sense it is kind of bizarre, something that may be hard to imagine, but it took more effort and close to as many hours to move the Dakota Squadron's C-53 (aka "Darlin Dorien') from Soesterberg Airport to the Wings of Liberation Museum in Best, as it took to fly the grand old lady from Mesa, Arizona to Eindhoven, the Netherlands.

The adventurous flight in 1997 must have been around 8000 miles and it took Bob Reid and his 4-man crew two weeks. The trip from the airfield to the museum in 1999, a trip all of 70 kilometers or a 45 mile 'plane hop', took several days and involved many people of many different disciplines.

Let's go back in time to 1997 for a minute. The same day the plane arrived at Eindhoven Airport, after its long flight home, it was flown to Gilze Rijen to take part in an airshow the next day. Following this airshow 'Darlin Dorien' was flown to Soesterberg for winter storage and to get some work done on one of the engines before the old lady would fly again. After about a year, the Dutch Airforce, who does not really want non-military airplanes on their airfields, starts a soft but insistent pushing for the plane to be moved to different quarters.

Before the plane, after having been in storage for over a year, can be flown anywhere, it has to go through an air-worthiness inspection, but as the plane, due to some engine problems, is not in a condition to fly, it is decided to cancel the inspection and transport the plane to the museum by other means.

This problem is handed over to the Royal Dutch Airforce Salvage Team. These are the experts at transporting planes 'without really flying'. W/O Henny Teunissen and his band of merry men take to the job. First they will remove the outer wings and the horizontal and verticals of the tail section and transport these to the museum using one or more 'Queen Mary' type trailers. This is, for them, a fairly normal transport, takes place during the night and does not attract a great deal of attention.

How different will that be when it is the fuselage's time to be transported. Like a full blown military operation the transport of the fuselage is planned, Military Police, Royal Dutch Army Engineers, Civilian Police, a 100-ton crane truck and a specially constructed barge are amongst the organizations and materials involved in the move.

The schedule is as follows:

2-24 - 0200 hours - the fuselage is loaded onto a 'Queen Mary' and is transported from Soesterberg to Nieuwegein by road.

2-24 - 0300 hours - the fuselage is loaded onto a barge where at 0430 hours a buffet is served because a birthday has to be celebrated (everything continues like normal, even considering the circumstances).

2-24 - 0700 hours - the Dakota starts floating in the direction of Oosterhout where it arrives at 1700 hours.

2-25 - 0800 hours - the fuselage is loaded onto a different (specially constructed) barge as the first one is too wide to pass some of the four locks between Oosterhout and Best.

2-25 - 1100 hours - transport picks up again and the Dakota fuselage is 'floated' to Tilburg where it arrives at 1800 hours.

2-26 - 0800 hours - the fuselage is transported to Best passing the locks of which one is, on each side, only about three inches wider than the total width of the barge.

2-26 - 1300 hours - the transport arrives at Best.

2-26 - 1400 hours - the fuselage is loaded onto a 'queen' again for the last leg to the museum where it arrives at 1630 hours and where the plane is placed in the location prepared for it.

In the weeks following the transport the plane is inspected for damage, is put back together again and is prepared to show it to the visitors of the museum. By now the wings and horizontals and verticals are back on and plans are made to construct a shelter over the plane that will allow visitors to come and see the work done on the plane to prepare it to fly again.

Jan Driessen

All in all this adventure made the Dakota Squadron's C-53 Dakota a very special plane, not only is it a unique plane that was actually used during operation Market Garden, it is also the only Dakota in the world that next to flying is able to sail and drive, and as such it did what it was built for -- it got the job done and did it well.

Roland Korst, Director (korst_ro@euronet.nl)
Dakota Squadron
Wings Of Liberation Museum
The Netherlands
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