Flying in a DC3

Aboard the 75-year old royal PH-PBA dakota

Oct. 19, 2019 - Willem L. Middelkoop

As a wonderful birthday gift I was honoured to fly in a DC-3 classic plane. It was the 75-year old PH-PBA, a C-47A Skytrain or Dakota, formerly owned by H.R.H. Prince Bernhard from The Netherlands. It's a very special plane operated by the enthusiastic people from the Dutch Dakota Association (DDA Classic Airlines). Read along for some aviation history!

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Rosie the Riverters work on the C-47 at the Douglas Plant in Oklahoma City (1944, Tinker Air Force Base History Office)

Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp radial aero engine on display at the Imperial War Museum Duxford (photo: Nimbus227)

Flying over the Zuidermeerdijk near Urk, with the Ketelbrug visible crossing the water

Flying over the village of Heeg with IJlst en Sneek visible on the horizon

U.S. Army Pathfinders and USAAF flight crew prior to D-Day (June, 1944, RAF North Witham, public domain)

Terherne visible at the — Terherne visible at the "Snitser Mar", Friesland

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Articles (156)

2025-01-18 Master of Change
2024-12-19 Data versus Feeling
2024-12-09 The Problem With Bitcoin
2024-11-11 Write your own words
2024-11-10 Go Viral on X
2024-10-20 Marathon
2024-09-10 I see dead people
2024-05-11 Developing a native iOS app
2024-03-24 Half Marathon
2024-03-05 No, I Won't Build That!
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2023-12-15 Backup Rotation Scheme
2023-11-10 Apple Watch as Phone
2023-11-01 And... there is light!
2023-10-14 Giving AI Training
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2023-05-31 Impact of training
2023-05-08 Tablet as Tool
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