Jacob Veldhuyzen van Zanten

Jacob Veldhuyzen van Zanten (born February 5, 1927 in Lisse , † March 27, 1977 in San Cristóbal de La Laguna ) was a flight captain and flight instructor for the Dutch airline KLM .

On KLM flight 4805 he was the captain of the Boeing 747-206B "Rijn" ( aircraft registration PH-BUF ), which took off from Tenerife on March 27, 1977 at Los Rodeos airport (former IATA airport code TCI, now TFN) a Pan Am Boeing 747-121 ("Clipper Victor", registration number N736PA ) collided. Veldhuyzen van Zanten is believed to be the main culprit in the Tenerife air disaster . In the worst civil aviation disaster to date without terrorist involvement, a total of 583 people were killed with Veldhuyzen van Zanten.

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Jacob Veldhuyzen van Zanten obtained his pilot license on June 21, 1947 and worked for the Dutch airline KLM from 1950. He was known within the KLM as a professional, ambitious pilot.

On January 23, 1971 he received the type rating for the Boeing 747. In the same year he flew to Seattle with two of his colleagues to receive the first Boeing 747 from KLM. His picture was used as part of a collage for an advertisement in the KLM on-board magazine, as he was being used as a flight instructor at the time and was therefore the only pilot available. In the six years before the accident, he was mainly employed as an instructor and headed the KLM flight school. Before the 747 he was an instructor on the Douglas DC-9 .

Jacob Veldhuyzen van Zanten was killed with all the occupants of his machine in the accident. At the time he had completed 11,700 flight hours, 1,545 of them on the Boeing 747. Veldhuyzen van Zanten left behind a wife and two children.

Role during the calamity

According to current knowledge, Veldhuyzen van Zanten was the main culprit for the collision of the two machines. When he had maneuvered his aircraft into take-off position, he said that he had already received clearance for take-off and began the take-off process. However, the Pan-Am-747 was still on the runway . When Veldhuyzen van Zanten recognized this aircraft in the fog, he started a hopeless rescue attempt, pulling his machine up steeply, whereupon it collided with the Pan-Am-747. After the collision, the KLM aircraft hit the runway and exploded, killing all 248 people on board. Of the 396 inmates of the Pan-Am-747, only 61 survived.

He played a major role in the cause of the accident, but was not ultimately the sole culprit. The Pan-Am-747 sent the information on the same radio channel that it was still on the runway. At the same time, the air traffic controller sent a message to the KLM crew, which is why there was an overlapping effect and neither of the two messages reached the cockpit of the KLM-747. In addition, Captain Veldhuyzen van Zanten was blinded by his everyday life in the flight simulator; he was used to being his own air traffic controller and giving himself clearance to take off. Deliberate action was ruled out.

In any case, the following communication (immediately after the overlay phase) was clearly audible for all involved: 17:06:25 Tower (to Pan Am): "Roger, Alpha one seven three six, notify us when the runway is free." : 06: 29 Pan Am: "OK, notify us when the runway is free." From this it had to be clear to the KLM crew that the runway was still blocked. The alerted KLM flight engineer addressed the following question to the test captain and fleet manager: "Hasn't he left yet, the Pan Am?" This was acknowledged by the latter (even after repeated repetition by the flight engineer) with a "of course" and the start continued unimpressed.

Web links

• Aviation Safety Network : Aircraft accident data and reports from the PanAm and KLM aircraft as well as transcripts of radio communications in the original language

Individual evidence

1. ↑ [1]
2. ↑ Jan Bartelski: Disasters in the air: mysterious air disasters explained . Airlife, 2001, ISBN 978-1-84037-204-5 , pp.?.
3. ↑ Human Factors Report on the Tenerife Accident ( English , PDF) Air Line Pilots Association, International .