Koene Dirk Parmentier

KD Parmentier

Parmentiers Douglas DC-2 "Uiver" on November 7, 1934 in Surabaya

Koene Dirk Parmentier (born September 27, 1904 in Amsterdam , Netherlands ; † October 21, 1948 Tarbolton , Ayrshire (Scotland)) was a Dutch aviation pioneer . Parmentier was chief pilot at KLM and was a close friend of the airline's founder and long-time managing director, Albert Plesman . Parmentier became known for his success at the MacRobertson air race in 1934.

Parmentier worked for Fokker between 1920 and 1924 and obtained his flight license in 1927 during his military service. In 1929 he became a pilot at KLM.

In 1934 Parmentier was honored to represent KLM at the MacRobertson air race from Mildenhall (Suffolk), England to Melbourne , Australia as captain of the Douglas DC-2 "Uiver". His crew included Jan Moll (copilot), Bouwe Prins (flight engineer) and Cor van Brugge (radio operator). Parmentier and his crew flew their passenger aircraft loaded with passengers, cargo and mail into second place. The DC-2 prevailed against racing planes and lightly loaded vans and was only defeated by a De Havilland DH.88 Comet specially designed for the race . Parmentier left this second place to the third-placed Boeing 247 from Roscoe Turner (details can be found in the article "MacRobertson air racing"). The DC-2 also won the handicap rating, which was calculated on the basis of a calculation of the transported payload and flight time. Parmentier and his crew were celebrated as national heroes on their return. He published his memories of this race in the book "In drie dagen naar Australie" (In three days to Australia).

When the German Wehrmacht invaded the Netherlands in 1940, Parmentier was one of the KLM personnel who were able to flee to England. Parmentier flew the DC-3 PH-ARZ "Zilverreiger" to England and contributed to the organization of the flight operations from England to Lisbon and Gibraltar , which were handed over to the war KLM. Parmentier received a medal for this after the war.

In 1945 Parmentier became chief pilot of the airline KLM and later head of flight operations. However, he was only able to carry out this work for a short time.

On October 20, 1948 at around 11:30 p.m. Parmentier flew a Lockheed Constellation ( aircraft registration PH-TEN) of KLM after an aborted attempt to land at Glasgow-Prestwick Airport against a high-voltage line lying in the fog . The six survivors of the accident were taken to hospitals, where they later succumbed to their injuries, killing all 40 inmates.