buy yourself a 737 job in HK!!
Join Date: Jan 2004
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Nothing better to do so..... Still haven't seen any new hires from ASG and I'm starting to think and hope that the people that started their typerating last month with ASG are fakes.
Like I suspected at the time it was just Otto V. himself posting on this website to fill his pockets....well to bad for him we are on to him. Ps. for people interested he's still offering 73 positions in HKG.
Coasty
Like I suspected at the time it was just Otto V. himself posting on this website to fill his pockets....well to bad for him we are on to him. Ps. for people interested he's still offering 73 positions in HKG.
Coasty
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Australia
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Anyone has information about a guy called
Jackie Ng,
B737-NG Pilot,
Managing Director of SinoFlite Aviation.
He says that is offering opportunites in China, that his office is in Hong Kong, but for what I know he is just collecting personal info and he is unapproachable.
Cheers
Jackie Ng,
B737-NG Pilot,
Managing Director of SinoFlite Aviation.
He says that is offering opportunites in China, that his office is in Hong Kong, but for what I know he is just collecting personal info and he is unapproachable.
Cheers
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Miami FL, USA
Age: 51
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media article
Some media background, I do not think it's recent:
The sky is the limit
Otto Vellinga’s speculation in brokering commercial pilot training
Otto Vellinga (53) is a broker who arranges for students to do their commercial pilot training in the States. Out in the States, the students find the training to be flimsy and rarely get the chance to clock up flying hours. And if they do get the chance, they can find themselves in dangerous aircraft. On top of that it costs an arm and a leg. Back in the Netherlands Otto Vellinga has no qualms about continuing to draw social security benefit.
By Arnold Karskens
Erik (29) who is currently training to be a pilot can count himself lucky. In 1995 a Jet Commander AC 1121 – a twin-engine aircraft belonging to the American Air Network (ANN) – crashed in Guatemala. A week earlier the Dutchman refused to continue flying the aircraft because he didn’t trust the instruments. “I felt it was dangerous. The speedometer and right-hand fuel gauge were not working properly and the fuel tanks were leaking.”
He was flying from Miami to Central America almost daily. A dangerous route often subject to bad weather – as it was on the day of the fatal crash when Erik wasn’t the one flying. His two colleagues didn’t know how much fuel they had on board and tried to land in a nearby airfield. Both died in the attempt. It is now eighteen months since the jet crashed and the American Air Network has not suffered any fatal accidents since, but aircraft have careered off the runway. Erik blames the quality of the training. “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.” One of Erik’s fellow students also flew with ANN: “Some of the boys who served as co-pilots had never flown that type of aircraft before and had no idea what they were doing for the first two hundred hours. Another student, Bas Verheul, says that the training with the simulator was discontinued. “When I asked if it was broken, they said, ‘No. The money has run out.’” American Air Network, which provides commercial pilot training, has been struggling with financial problems for years. Erik: “The whole fleet is old and some of the aircraft put people’s lives at risk – as has been proved.”
Erik is one of ten students we spoke to about their pilot training in the States. All of the students were dissatisfied with the training and all had signed a contract with Otto Heinz Vellinga – a Dutch businessman who lives in the little town of Garderen near Barneveld. Vellinga is essentially a broker. He acts as an intermediary between students and aviation schools and flight training courses in the United States. The students describe Otto Heinz Vellinga as an excellent salesman. One of the students said: “He can be very charming, but, when it comes down to it, he is as hard as nails. He has no principles. He will simply say: ‘It’s there in the contract in black and white. It’s not my problem.’”
For a long time Vellinga worked for the Television Licence Fee Department in the Netherlands. After that he ran the Independent Pilot Service in Hoofdorp – an association that advised those who aspired to be pilots. The association was discontinued in 1995 because it no longer offered any obvious advantage as a legal entity. These days he acts as a broker for students who want to train as a pilot. He set up the American Support Group (ASG) for this purpose, which according to its articles of association, is based in New Castle in the American state of Delaware. Vellinga is CEO/President and his wife, Agnes N. Vellinga-Dam, is a director of the American company. The contact address in the Netherlands is Puterweg 46-1 in Garderen, which is Otto Vellinga’s home address. There is a reason why the company is based in the United States. On 1 June 1993 Vellinga started drawing weekly social security benefit of NLG 357.30 under the new Unemployment Insurance Act Every as a resident at the said address, and has continued to do so ever since. His wife also receives benefit from the Industrial Insurance Administration Office in the Netherlands, which in her case amounts to NLG 1773.93 per month. On inquiry, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) revealed that the couple own two aircraft via ASG-leasing: a single-engine Mooney M-20 (registration number N 9122 V) and a Piper Aztec (registration number N 6326 Y). The latter is a twin-engine aircraft used for multi-engine training. The two aircraft are estimated to be worth approximately a quarter of a million guilders.
ASG President Otto Vellinga places advertisements in newspapers such as De Telegraaf and aviation journals such as Piloot & Vliegtuig to attract students. Those who show an interest are male and female trainee pilots with several flight training certificates who want to gain more practical flight experience.
Vellinga refers those who want to clock up ‘heavy’ jet hours to the American Air Network based in Chesterfield in Missouri, which is presided over by Douglas Gilliland. According to information obtained from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), over a period of ten years the AAN has failed to comply with the safety regulations on nine occasions. Their offences include failing to respect work and break times, falsifying the logbooks in which the pilots are supposed to note the flying hours they have completed, and flying passenger aircraft without the necessary licence.
Last week Gilliland was in the Netherlands to recruit students together with Otto Vellinga. In a restaurant in Garderen the two outlined the advantages of commercial pilot training in the States to some fifteen potential students. In practice it all boils down to the fact that the students get to serve as co-pilots on regular freight flights – a bit like a co-driver in a truck. But they pay through the nose for the privilege. Vellinga charges each student 45,000 dollars and passes on between 6,000 and 8,000 dollars to the American Air Network. One of the students described it as pure speculation: “As far as they are concerned we are simply cheap labour. We are there on the strength of a student visa, so we are not allowed to earn money. Co-pilots normally earn 250 dollars for a five-hour flight. I earn nothing. In fact I have to pay to be there.”
It is hardly surprising that Vellinga sends his students to the States. The better weather makes for more flying hours. There are fewer flight movements in the Netherlands, which means less chance to clock up ‘heavy hours’. There is also another advantage in sending students to the States – certainly as far as Vellinga is concerned. He can then get them to sign American contracts, which makes it very difficult for them to seek redress through the Dutch courts.
A student who experienced it all first hand said, “When the American Air Network needs personnel Vellinga sends them ten students. One or two of the ten are selected – or are smart enough to get the contract changed before they sign it. They are the ones that get to fly, to the extent that you can call it that at ANN. The other eight are sent from pillar to post. Until they abandon the training. They might spend an hour and a half in the air in six months.”
This was exactly what happened to a student from Bussum. He spent six months in the States, and is now 35,000 dollars worse off – and that’s without counting the travelling and accommodation expenses which added up to 6,000 dollars. He signed the contract on 7 October of last year and was supposed to start training in Miami in December. By the end of March he had completed three thirty minute flights to Guatemala – the same destination that the fated jet was headed for. Again the instructors didn’t bother with the safety regulations. “I already had my licence, but for that particular aircraft you need training and you also need to pass exams. That never happened. The jets are extremely fast and light. A heavy gust of wind will cause them to career off the runway. Things regularly go wrong. I contacted the Federal Aviation Administration and told them ‘I don’t know what’s going on here. They want to put me in a cockpit without any training – that’s illegal.’”
When the student expressed concern to the people at ANN, they made things so difficult for him that he abandoned the training. They kept sending him from one airfield to another. Besides losing a great deal of time, the student also had to cover the travelling expenses and the cost of staying in hotels. “At a certain point you simply run out of money and decide to return to the Netherlands. Then Vellinga says, ‘You abandoned the training.’ The contract states that students who decide not to complete the training are not entitled to a refund.”
Bas Verheul from Utrecht invested 38,250 dollars in the American Support Group and left without gaining any flight training certificates. “I spent 25,000 dollars on the jet training programme, which I never completed, and 9,000 dollars on a type rating certification for a specific aircraft but was never given the training.”
Fellow student Bart travelled out the States at the beginning of December, after paying 100,000 guilders into Vellinga’s account. For that he got to log just 140 hours. “For that amount of money I could have gained all of my flight training certificates at bona fide flight training schools in the same time.
Until recently Vellinga also sent students to the Midwestern Airways flight training school in Escanaba in the state of Michigan, which ran flying courses for beginners who wished to gain their Private Pilot’s Licence. Belgian student Nele Convents (18) signed a contract with Otto Vellinga and paid him 16,800 dollars. She got to spend 26 hours in the air and three months later she returned to Belgium without having gained her licence. “Someone who travelled to the States independently and signed up with any flight training school would pay between 4,000 and 5,000 dollars for the same training,” she says. The instructors at Midwestern Airways flight training school also disregard safety regulations that are considered to be standard practice in the Netherlands. Nele Convents: “There was no VOR (a type of radio navigation system that makes it possible to determine the specific position of an aircraft) and the hydraulic system of the landing gear of one of the single-engine aircraft – a Moony M-20 – didn’t always work. On one occasion the aircraft landed on its body.”
Jan-Frans Blokland (27) from Heerjansdam arrived in Escanaba on 17 January and found the whole set up to be a shambles. He was supposed to undergo a compulsory medical examination but was told that an appointment would be made in due course. There were none of the textbooks needed for the theoretical part of the course. When officials from the Federal Aviation Administration – the agency that sees to it that safety regulations are complied with – visited the airfield, the instructor who taught the theory was out of there like a shot. Blokland: “He was actually an advanced student with 1,300 flying hours under his belt. He wasn’t a qualified instructor.”
Blokland was given his first flying lesson in an aircraft without a radio. “My Norwegian instructor stressed time and time again how dangerous that was.” Jan-Frans Blokland had dreamt of training as a pilot for years. He gave up his job and headed for the branch of the ABN-AMRO bank in Barendrecht where he asked for a loan of 250,000 guilders – enough to cover the cost of gaining a full pilot’s licence at Tulip Air, an accredited flight training school in Amstelveen. The ‘specialist’ at the ABN-AMRO head office – a Mr Zwaneveld – refused to authorise the loan and advised Blokland to train with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. He said he would be happy to authorise a loan for such an undertaking. ABN-AMRO had already referred several students to Vellinga and it had been a good move.”
Jan-Frans Blokland: “In the back of your mind you think, if ABN-AMRO is prepared to recommend it, it must be good.” Blokland went ahead on this basis. He paid an advance of 41,000 guilders into a bank account in the States and set off for Michigan on 16 January of this year. Three weeks later the Midwestern Airways flight training school, for which Vellinga’s American Support Group acted as a broker, went bust. Jan-Frans Blokland and his parents, who put up their house as security, claim that they were given misleading advice. Mr Zwaneveld has admitted that he does business with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group, but refuses to discuss this particular case.
Midwestern Airways stopped its flight training activities after another five students had each signed a contract and paid 50,000 dollars for advanced flight training. It is probably worth noting that Midwestern Airways is run by Otto Vellinga’s daughter in law, while his son, John Vellinga, is ‘executive vice-president’ of Midwestern Airways and vice-president of the American Support Group.
People have been complaining about Otto Vellinga for years, but few have taken action against him. A student from Bussum said, “Taking action against Otto Vellinga would be an expensive business, not only in terms of money, but also in terms of time. You might win the case, but there is still no guarantee that you would get your money back. And we are all students who still have a long way to go in the world of aviation. Once you get a reputation for being difficult, you’re stuck with it. Vellinga himself also uses this as a threat. He says, ‘I’ll see to it that you never get another job as a pilot.’” Erik, the student who narrowly escaped the jet crash, says, “Douglas Gilliland of AAN, who recruits students via Vellinga, allows students to break the aviation laws, but the students then become an accessory, which makes it difficult for them to approach the aviation authorities.
In 1993, Ronald, a former student, paid Otto Vellinga 24,000 dollars for 300 flying hours on a Beach 1900. Hours that – like so many students – he never got to fly. Eventually he ran out of money and had to get his practical flight experience elsewhere. Which he did. He now works for an accredited flight training institute and is calling for greater government control. There are 25 to 30 flight training institutes in the Netherlands, which range from the KLM Flight Academy, which is recognised by the Civil Aviation Authority in the Netherlands (RLD), to outfits such as Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. Between them they train several hundred pilots every year. Ronald: “There needs to be an independent body in the Netherlands that assesses and monitors flight training schools and brokers and certifies bona fide companies.”
Mr Leeman in Limmen, whose son was swindled a few years ago, says that things have got out of hand. “Most airlines no longer run their own flight training institutes. An airline will say, you can come and work for us but you must have at least 500 hours of flying experience and you have to get those yourself. This keeps people such as Vellinga in business.”
Nieuwe Revu invited Otto Vellinga to comment. He declined and referred us to his lawyer, Menno Stokvis. He dismisses all of the stories as ‘urban myths’. But he is not willing to refute them. ·
[caption]
This aircraft in which Erik was given flying lessons later crashed.
[quote]
Erik (29): “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.”
The sky is the limit
Otto Vellinga’s speculation in brokering commercial pilot training
Otto Vellinga (53) is a broker who arranges for students to do their commercial pilot training in the States. Out in the States, the students find the training to be flimsy and rarely get the chance to clock up flying hours. And if they do get the chance, they can find themselves in dangerous aircraft. On top of that it costs an arm and a leg. Back in the Netherlands Otto Vellinga has no qualms about continuing to draw social security benefit.
By Arnold Karskens
Erik (29) who is currently training to be a pilot can count himself lucky. In 1995 a Jet Commander AC 1121 – a twin-engine aircraft belonging to the American Air Network (ANN) – crashed in Guatemala. A week earlier the Dutchman refused to continue flying the aircraft because he didn’t trust the instruments. “I felt it was dangerous. The speedometer and right-hand fuel gauge were not working properly and the fuel tanks were leaking.”
He was flying from Miami to Central America almost daily. A dangerous route often subject to bad weather – as it was on the day of the fatal crash when Erik wasn’t the one flying. His two colleagues didn’t know how much fuel they had on board and tried to land in a nearby airfield. Both died in the attempt. It is now eighteen months since the jet crashed and the American Air Network has not suffered any fatal accidents since, but aircraft have careered off the runway. Erik blames the quality of the training. “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.” One of Erik’s fellow students also flew with ANN: “Some of the boys who served as co-pilots had never flown that type of aircraft before and had no idea what they were doing for the first two hundred hours. Another student, Bas Verheul, says that the training with the simulator was discontinued. “When I asked if it was broken, they said, ‘No. The money has run out.’” American Air Network, which provides commercial pilot training, has been struggling with financial problems for years. Erik: “The whole fleet is old and some of the aircraft put people’s lives at risk – as has been proved.”
Erik is one of ten students we spoke to about their pilot training in the States. All of the students were dissatisfied with the training and all had signed a contract with Otto Heinz Vellinga – a Dutch businessman who lives in the little town of Garderen near Barneveld. Vellinga is essentially a broker. He acts as an intermediary between students and aviation schools and flight training courses in the United States. The students describe Otto Heinz Vellinga as an excellent salesman. One of the students said: “He can be very charming, but, when it comes down to it, he is as hard as nails. He has no principles. He will simply say: ‘It’s there in the contract in black and white. It’s not my problem.’”
For a long time Vellinga worked for the Television Licence Fee Department in the Netherlands. After that he ran the Independent Pilot Service in Hoofdorp – an association that advised those who aspired to be pilots. The association was discontinued in 1995 because it no longer offered any obvious advantage as a legal entity. These days he acts as a broker for students who want to train as a pilot. He set up the American Support Group (ASG) for this purpose, which according to its articles of association, is based in New Castle in the American state of Delaware. Vellinga is CEO/President and his wife, Agnes N. Vellinga-Dam, is a director of the American company. The contact address in the Netherlands is Puterweg 46-1 in Garderen, which is Otto Vellinga’s home address. There is a reason why the company is based in the United States. On 1 June 1993 Vellinga started drawing weekly social security benefit of NLG 357.30 under the new Unemployment Insurance Act Every as a resident at the said address, and has continued to do so ever since. His wife also receives benefit from the Industrial Insurance Administration Office in the Netherlands, which in her case amounts to NLG 1773.93 per month. On inquiry, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) revealed that the couple own two aircraft via ASG-leasing: a single-engine Mooney M-20 (registration number N 9122 V) and a Piper Aztec (registration number N 6326 Y). The latter is a twin-engine aircraft used for multi-engine training. The two aircraft are estimated to be worth approximately a quarter of a million guilders.
ASG President Otto Vellinga places advertisements in newspapers such as De Telegraaf and aviation journals such as Piloot & Vliegtuig to attract students. Those who show an interest are male and female trainee pilots with several flight training certificates who want to gain more practical flight experience.
Vellinga refers those who want to clock up ‘heavy’ jet hours to the American Air Network based in Chesterfield in Missouri, which is presided over by Douglas Gilliland. According to information obtained from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), over a period of ten years the AAN has failed to comply with the safety regulations on nine occasions. Their offences include failing to respect work and break times, falsifying the logbooks in which the pilots are supposed to note the flying hours they have completed, and flying passenger aircraft without the necessary licence.
Last week Gilliland was in the Netherlands to recruit students together with Otto Vellinga. In a restaurant in Garderen the two outlined the advantages of commercial pilot training in the States to some fifteen potential students. In practice it all boils down to the fact that the students get to serve as co-pilots on regular freight flights – a bit like a co-driver in a truck. But they pay through the nose for the privilege. Vellinga charges each student 45,000 dollars and passes on between 6,000 and 8,000 dollars to the American Air Network. One of the students described it as pure speculation: “As far as they are concerned we are simply cheap labour. We are there on the strength of a student visa, so we are not allowed to earn money. Co-pilots normally earn 250 dollars for a five-hour flight. I earn nothing. In fact I have to pay to be there.”
It is hardly surprising that Vellinga sends his students to the States. The better weather makes for more flying hours. There are fewer flight movements in the Netherlands, which means less chance to clock up ‘heavy hours’. There is also another advantage in sending students to the States – certainly as far as Vellinga is concerned. He can then get them to sign American contracts, which makes it very difficult for them to seek redress through the Dutch courts.
A student who experienced it all first hand said, “When the American Air Network needs personnel Vellinga sends them ten students. One or two of the ten are selected – or are smart enough to get the contract changed before they sign it. They are the ones that get to fly, to the extent that you can call it that at ANN. The other eight are sent from pillar to post. Until they abandon the training. They might spend an hour and a half in the air in six months.”
This was exactly what happened to a student from Bussum. He spent six months in the States, and is now 35,000 dollars worse off – and that’s without counting the travelling and accommodation expenses which added up to 6,000 dollars. He signed the contract on 7 October of last year and was supposed to start training in Miami in December. By the end of March he had completed three thirty minute flights to Guatemala – the same destination that the fated jet was headed for. Again the instructors didn’t bother with the safety regulations. “I already had my licence, but for that particular aircraft you need training and you also need to pass exams. That never happened. The jets are extremely fast and light. A heavy gust of wind will cause them to career off the runway. Things regularly go wrong. I contacted the Federal Aviation Administration and told them ‘I don’t know what’s going on here. They want to put me in a cockpit without any training – that’s illegal.’”
When the student expressed concern to the people at ANN, they made things so difficult for him that he abandoned the training. They kept sending him from one airfield to another. Besides losing a great deal of time, the student also had to cover the travelling expenses and the cost of staying in hotels. “At a certain point you simply run out of money and decide to return to the Netherlands. Then Vellinga says, ‘You abandoned the training.’ The contract states that students who decide not to complete the training are not entitled to a refund.”
Bas Verheul from Utrecht invested 38,250 dollars in the American Support Group and left without gaining any flight training certificates. “I spent 25,000 dollars on the jet training programme, which I never completed, and 9,000 dollars on a type rating certification for a specific aircraft but was never given the training.”
Fellow student Bart travelled out the States at the beginning of December, after paying 100,000 guilders into Vellinga’s account. For that he got to log just 140 hours. “For that amount of money I could have gained all of my flight training certificates at bona fide flight training schools in the same time.
Until recently Vellinga also sent students to the Midwestern Airways flight training school in Escanaba in the state of Michigan, which ran flying courses for beginners who wished to gain their Private Pilot’s Licence. Belgian student Nele Convents (18) signed a contract with Otto Vellinga and paid him 16,800 dollars. She got to spend 26 hours in the air and three months later she returned to Belgium without having gained her licence. “Someone who travelled to the States independently and signed up with any flight training school would pay between 4,000 and 5,000 dollars for the same training,” she says. The instructors at Midwestern Airways flight training school also disregard safety regulations that are considered to be standard practice in the Netherlands. Nele Convents: “There was no VOR (a type of radio navigation system that makes it possible to determine the specific position of an aircraft) and the hydraulic system of the landing gear of one of the single-engine aircraft – a Moony M-20 – didn’t always work. On one occasion the aircraft landed on its body.”
Jan-Frans Blokland (27) from Heerjansdam arrived in Escanaba on 17 January and found the whole set up to be a shambles. He was supposed to undergo a compulsory medical examination but was told that an appointment would be made in due course. There were none of the textbooks needed for the theoretical part of the course. When officials from the Federal Aviation Administration – the agency that sees to it that safety regulations are complied with – visited the airfield, the instructor who taught the theory was out of there like a shot. Blokland: “He was actually an advanced student with 1,300 flying hours under his belt. He wasn’t a qualified instructor.”
Blokland was given his first flying lesson in an aircraft without a radio. “My Norwegian instructor stressed time and time again how dangerous that was.” Jan-Frans Blokland had dreamt of training as a pilot for years. He gave up his job and headed for the branch of the ABN-AMRO bank in Barendrecht where he asked for a loan of 250,000 guilders – enough to cover the cost of gaining a full pilot’s licence at Tulip Air, an accredited flight training school in Amstelveen. The ‘specialist’ at the ABN-AMRO head office – a Mr Zwaneveld – refused to authorise the loan and advised Blokland to train with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. He said he would be happy to authorise a loan for such an undertaking. ABN-AMRO had already referred several students to Vellinga and it had been a good move.”
Jan-Frans Blokland: “In the back of your mind you think, if ABN-AMRO is prepared to recommend it, it must be good.” Blokland went ahead on this basis. He paid an advance of 41,000 guilders into a bank account in the States and set off for Michigan on 16 January of this year. Three weeks later the Midwestern Airways flight training school, for which Vellinga’s American Support Group acted as a broker, went bust. Jan-Frans Blokland and his parents, who put up their house as security, claim that they were given misleading advice. Mr Zwaneveld has admitted that he does business with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group, but refuses to discuss this particular case.
Midwestern Airways stopped its flight training activities after another five students had each signed a contract and paid 50,000 dollars for advanced flight training. It is probably worth noting that Midwestern Airways is run by Otto Vellinga’s daughter in law, while his son, John Vellinga, is ‘executive vice-president’ of Midwestern Airways and vice-president of the American Support Group.
People have been complaining about Otto Vellinga for years, but few have taken action against him. A student from Bussum said, “Taking action against Otto Vellinga would be an expensive business, not only in terms of money, but also in terms of time. You might win the case, but there is still no guarantee that you would get your money back. And we are all students who still have a long way to go in the world of aviation. Once you get a reputation for being difficult, you’re stuck with it. Vellinga himself also uses this as a threat. He says, ‘I’ll see to it that you never get another job as a pilot.’” Erik, the student who narrowly escaped the jet crash, says, “Douglas Gilliland of AAN, who recruits students via Vellinga, allows students to break the aviation laws, but the students then become an accessory, which makes it difficult for them to approach the aviation authorities.
In 1993, Ronald, a former student, paid Otto Vellinga 24,000 dollars for 300 flying hours on a Beach 1900. Hours that – like so many students – he never got to fly. Eventually he ran out of money and had to get his practical flight experience elsewhere. Which he did. He now works for an accredited flight training institute and is calling for greater government control. There are 25 to 30 flight training institutes in the Netherlands, which range from the KLM Flight Academy, which is recognised by the Civil Aviation Authority in the Netherlands (RLD), to outfits such as Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. Between them they train several hundred pilots every year. Ronald: “There needs to be an independent body in the Netherlands that assesses and monitors flight training schools and brokers and certifies bona fide companies.”
Mr Leeman in Limmen, whose son was swindled a few years ago, says that things have got out of hand. “Most airlines no longer run their own flight training institutes. An airline will say, you can come and work for us but you must have at least 500 hours of flying experience and you have to get those yourself. This keeps people such as Vellinga in business.”
Nieuwe Revu invited Otto Vellinga to comment. He declined and referred us to his lawyer, Menno Stokvis. He dismisses all of the stories as ‘urban myths’. But he is not willing to refute them. ·
[caption]
This aircraft in which Erik was given flying lessons later crashed.
[quote]
Erik (29): “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.”
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Miami FL, USA
Age: 51
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useful translation
Herewith an english translation of that article you uploaded, for all those of you whose dutch is somewhat rusty...
The sky is the limit
Otto Vellinga’s speculation in brokering commercial pilot training
Otto Vellinga (53) is a broker who arranges for students to do their commercial pilot training in the States. Out in the States, the students find the training to be flimsy and rarely get the chance to clock up flying hours. And if they do get the chance, they can find themselves in dangerous aircraft. On top of that it costs an arm and a leg. Back in the Netherlands Otto Vellinga has no qualms about continuing to draw social security benefit.
By Arnold Karskens
Erik (29) who is currently training to be a pilot can count himself lucky. In 1995 a Jet Commander AC 1121 – a twin-engine aircraft belonging to the American Air Network (ANN) – crashed in Guatemala. A week earlier the Dutchman refused to continue flying the aircraft because he didn’t trust the instruments. “I felt it was dangerous. The speedometer and right-hand fuel gauge were not working properly and the fuel tanks were leaking.”
He was flying from Miami to Central America almost daily. A dangerous route often subject to bad weather – as it was on the day of the fatal crash when Erik wasn’t the one flying. His two colleagues didn’t know how much fuel they had on board and tried to land in a nearby airfield. Both died in the attempt. It is now eighteen months since the jet crashed and the American Air Network has not suffered any fatal accidents since, but aircraft have careered off the runway. Erik blames the quality of the training. “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.” One of Erik’s fellow students also flew with ANN: “Some of the boys who served as co-pilots had never flown that type of aircraft before and had no idea what they were doing for the first two hundred hours. Another student, Bas Verheul, says that the training with the simulator was discontinued. “When I asked if it was broken, they said, ‘No. The money has run out.’” American Air Network, which provides commercial pilot training, has been struggling with financial problems for years. Erik: “The whole fleet is old and some of the aircraft put people’s lives at risk – as has been proved.”
Erik is one of ten students we spoke to about their pilot training in the States. All of the students were dissatisfied with the training and all had signed a contract with Otto Heinz Vellinga – a Dutch businessman who lives in the little town of Garderen near Barneveld. Vellinga is essentially a broker. He acts as an intermediary between students and aviation schools and flight training courses in the United States. The students describe Otto Heinz Vellinga as an excellent salesman. One of the students said: “He can be very charming, but, when it comes down to it, he is as hard as nails. He has no principles. He will simply say: ‘It’s there in the contract in black and white. It’s not my problem.’”
For a long time Vellinga worked for the Television Licence Fee Department in the Netherlands. After that he ran the Independent Pilot Service in Hoofdorp – an association that advised those who aspired to be pilots. The association was discontinued in 1995 because it no longer offered any obvious advantage as a legal entity. These days he acts as a broker for students who want to train as a pilot. He set up the American Support Group (ASG) for this purpose, which according to its articles of association, is based in New Castle in the American state of Delaware. Vellinga is CEO/President and his wife, Agnes N. Vellinga-Dam, is a director of the American company. The contact address in the Netherlands is Puterweg 46-1 in Garderen, which is Otto Vellinga’s home address. There is a reason why the company is based in the United States. On 1 June 1993 Vellinga started drawing weekly social security benefit of NLG 357.30 under the new Unemployment Insurance Act Every as a resident at the said address, and has continued to do so ever since. His wife also receives benefit from the Industrial Insurance Administration Office in the Netherlands, which in her case amounts to NLG 1773.93 per month. On inquiry, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) revealed that the couple own two aircraft via ASG-leasing: a single-engine Mooney M-20 (registration number N 9122 V) and a Piper Aztec (registration number N 6326 Y). The latter is a twin-engine aircraft used for multi-engine training. The two aircraft are estimated to be worth approximately a quarter of a million guilders.
ASG President Otto Vellinga places advertisements in newspapers such as De Telegraaf and aviation journals such as Piloot & Vliegtuig to attract students. Those who show an interest are male and female trainee pilots with several flight training certificates who want to gain more practical flight experience.
Vellinga refers those who want to clock up ‘heavy’ jet hours to the American Air Network based in Chesterfield in Missouri, which is presided over by Douglas Gilliland. According to information obtained from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), over a period of ten years the AAN has failed to comply with the safety regulations on nine occasions. Their offences include failing to respect work and break times, falsifying the logbooks in which the pilots are supposed to note the flying hours they have completed, and flying passenger aircraft without the necessary licence.
Last week Gilliland was in the Netherlands to recruit students together with Otto Vellinga. In a restaurant in Garderen the two outlined the advantages of commercial pilot training in the States to some fifteen potential students. In practice it all boils down to the fact that the students get to serve as co-pilots on regular freight flights – a bit like a co-driver in a truck. But they pay through the nose for the privilege. Vellinga charges each student 45,000 dollars and passes on between 6,000 and 8,000 dollars to the American Air Network. One of the students described it as pure speculation: “As far as they are concerned we are simply cheap labour. We are there on the strength of a student visa, so we are not allowed to earn money. Co-pilots normally earn 250 dollars for a five-hour flight. I earn nothing. In fact I have to pay to be there.”
It is hardly surprising that Vellinga sends his students to the States. The better weather makes for more flying hours. There are fewer flight movements in the Netherlands, which means less chance to clock up ‘heavy hours’. There is also another advantage in sending students to the States – certainly as far as Vellinga is concerned. He can then get them to sign American contracts, which makes it very difficult for them to seek redress through the Dutch courts.
A student who experienced it all first hand said, “When the American Air Network needs personnel Vellinga sends them ten students. One or two of the ten are selected – or are smart enough to get the contract changed before they sign it. They are the ones that get to fly, to the extent that you can call it that at ANN. The other eight are sent from pillar to post. Until they abandon the training. They might spend an hour and a half in the air in six months.”
This was exactly what happened to a student from Bussum. He spent six months in the States, and is now 35,000 dollars worse off – and that’s without counting the travelling and accommodation expenses which added up to 6,000 dollars. He signed the contract on 7 October of last year and was supposed to start training in Miami in December. By the end of March he had completed three thirty minute flights to Guatemala – the same destination that the fated jet was headed for. Again the instructors didn’t bother with the safety regulations. “I already had my licence, but for that particular aircraft you need training and you also need to pass exams. That never happened. The jets are extremely fast and light. A heavy gust of wind will cause them to career off the runway. Things regularly go wrong. I contacted the Federal Aviation Administration and told them ‘I don’t know what’s going on here. They want to put me in a cockpit without any training – that’s illegal.’”
When the student expressed concern to the people at ANN, they made things so difficult for him that he abandoned the training. They kept sending him from one airfield to another. Besides losing a great deal of time, the student also had to cover the travelling expenses and the cost of staying in hotels. “At a certain point you simply run out of money and decide to return to the Netherlands. Then Vellinga says, ‘You abandoned the training.’ The contract states that students who decide not to complete the training are not entitled to a refund.”
Bas Verheul from Utrecht invested 38,250 dollars in the American Support Group and left without gaining any flight training certificates. “I spent 25,000 dollars on the jet training programme, which I never completed, and 9,000 dollars on a type rating certification for a specific aircraft but was never given the training.”
Fellow student Bart travelled out the States at the beginning of December, after paying 100,000 guilders into Vellinga’s account. For that he got to log just 140 hours. “For that amount of money I could have gained all of my flight training certificates at bona fide flight training schools in the same time.
Until recently Vellinga also sent students to the Midwestern Airways flight training school in Escanaba in the state of Michigan, which ran flying courses for beginners who wished to gain their Private Pilot’s Licence. Belgian student Nele Convents (18) signed a contract with Otto Vellinga and paid him 16,800 dollars. She got to spend 26 hours in the air and three months later she returned to Belgium without having gained her licence. “Someone who travelled to the States independently and signed up with any flight training school would pay between 4,000 and 5,000 dollars for the same training,” she says. The instructors at Midwestern Airways flight training school also disregard safety regulations that are considered to be standard practice in the Netherlands. Nele Convents: “There was no VOR (a type of radio navigation system that makes it possible to determine the specific position of an aircraft) and the hydraulic system of the landing gear of one of the single-engine aircraft – a Moony M-20 – didn’t always work. On one occasion the aircraft landed on its body.”
Jan-Frans Blokland (27) from Heerjansdam arrived in Escanaba on 17 January and found the whole set up to be a shambles. He was supposed to undergo a compulsory medical examination but was told that an appointment would be made in due course. There were none of the textbooks needed for the theoretical part of the course. When officials from the Federal Aviation Administration – the agency that sees to it that safety regulations are complied with – visited the airfield, the instructor who taught the theory was out of there like a shot. Blokland: “He was actually an advanced student with 1,300 flying hours under his belt. He wasn’t a qualified instructor.”
Blokland was given his first flying lesson in an aircraft without a radio. “My Norwegian instructor stressed time and time again how dangerous that was.” Jan-Frans Blokland had dreamt of training as a pilot for years. He gave up his job and headed for the branch of the ABN-AMRO bank in Barendrecht where he asked for a loan of 250,000 guilders – enough to cover the cost of gaining a full pilot’s licence at Tulip Air, an accredited flight training school in Amstelveen. The ‘specialist’ at the ABN-AMRO head office – a Mr Zwaneveld – refused to authorise the loan and advised Blokland to train with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. He said he would be happy to authorise a loan for such an undertaking. ABN-AMRO had already referred several students to Vellinga and it had been a good move.”
Jan-Frans Blokland: “In the back of your mind you think, if ABN-AMRO is prepared to recommend it, it must be good.” Blokland went ahead on this basis. He paid an advance of 41,000 guilders into a bank account in the States and set off for Michigan on 16 January of this year. Three weeks later the Midwestern Airways flight training school, for which Vellinga’s American Support Group acted as a broker, went bust. Jan-Frans Blokland and his parents, who put up their house as security, claim that they were given misleading advice. Mr Zwaneveld has admitted that he does business with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group, but refuses to discuss this particular case.
Midwestern Airways stopped its flight training activities after another five students had each signed a contract and paid 50,000 dollars for advanced flight training. It is probably worth noting that Midwestern Airways is run by Otto Vellinga’s daughter in law, while his son, John Vellinga, is ‘executive vice-president’ of Midwestern Airways and vice-president of the American Support Group.
People have been complaining about Otto Vellinga for years, but few have taken action against him. A student from Bussum said, “Taking action against Otto Vellinga would be an expensive business, not only in terms of money, but also in terms of time. You might win the case, but there is still no guarantee that you would get your money back. And we are all students who still have a long way to go in the world of aviation. Once you get a reputation for being difficult, you’re stuck with it. Vellinga himself also uses this as a threat. He says, ‘I’ll see to it that you never get another job as a pilot.’” Erik, the student who narrowly escaped the jet crash, says, “Douglas Gilliland of AAN, who recruits students via Vellinga, allows students to break the aviation laws, but the students then become an accessory, which makes it difficult for them to approach the aviation authorities.
In 1993, Ronald, a former student, paid Otto Vellinga 24,000 dollars for 300 flying hours on a Beach 1900. Hours that – like so many students – he never got to fly. Eventually he ran out of money and had to get his practical flight experience elsewhere. Which he did. He now works for an accredited flight training institute and is calling for greater government control. There are 25 to 30 flight training institutes in the Netherlands, which range from the KLM Flight Academy, which is recognised by the Civil Aviation Authority in the Netherlands (RLD), to outfits such as Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. Between them they train several hundred pilots every year. Ronald: “There needs to be an independent body in the Netherlands that assesses and monitors flight training schools and brokers and certifies bona fide companies.”
Mr Leeman in Limmen, whose son was swindled a few years ago, says that things have got out of hand. “Most airlines no longer run their own flight training institutes. An airline will say, you can come and work for us but you must have at least 500 hours of flying experience and you have to get those yourself. This keeps people such as Vellinga in business.”
Nieuwe Revu invited Otto Vellinga to comment. He declined and referred us to his lawyer, Menno Stokvis. He dismisses all of the stories as ‘urban myths’. But he is not willing to refute them. ·
[caption]
This aircraft in which Erik was given flying lessons later crashed.
[quote]
Erik (29): “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.”
The sky is the limit
Otto Vellinga’s speculation in brokering commercial pilot training
Otto Vellinga (53) is a broker who arranges for students to do their commercial pilot training in the States. Out in the States, the students find the training to be flimsy and rarely get the chance to clock up flying hours. And if they do get the chance, they can find themselves in dangerous aircraft. On top of that it costs an arm and a leg. Back in the Netherlands Otto Vellinga has no qualms about continuing to draw social security benefit.
By Arnold Karskens
Erik (29) who is currently training to be a pilot can count himself lucky. In 1995 a Jet Commander AC 1121 – a twin-engine aircraft belonging to the American Air Network (ANN) – crashed in Guatemala. A week earlier the Dutchman refused to continue flying the aircraft because he didn’t trust the instruments. “I felt it was dangerous. The speedometer and right-hand fuel gauge were not working properly and the fuel tanks were leaking.”
He was flying from Miami to Central America almost daily. A dangerous route often subject to bad weather – as it was on the day of the fatal crash when Erik wasn’t the one flying. His two colleagues didn’t know how much fuel they had on board and tried to land in a nearby airfield. Both died in the attempt. It is now eighteen months since the jet crashed and the American Air Network has not suffered any fatal accidents since, but aircraft have careered off the runway. Erik blames the quality of the training. “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.” One of Erik’s fellow students also flew with ANN: “Some of the boys who served as co-pilots had never flown that type of aircraft before and had no idea what they were doing for the first two hundred hours. Another student, Bas Verheul, says that the training with the simulator was discontinued. “When I asked if it was broken, they said, ‘No. The money has run out.’” American Air Network, which provides commercial pilot training, has been struggling with financial problems for years. Erik: “The whole fleet is old and some of the aircraft put people’s lives at risk – as has been proved.”
Erik is one of ten students we spoke to about their pilot training in the States. All of the students were dissatisfied with the training and all had signed a contract with Otto Heinz Vellinga – a Dutch businessman who lives in the little town of Garderen near Barneveld. Vellinga is essentially a broker. He acts as an intermediary between students and aviation schools and flight training courses in the United States. The students describe Otto Heinz Vellinga as an excellent salesman. One of the students said: “He can be very charming, but, when it comes down to it, he is as hard as nails. He has no principles. He will simply say: ‘It’s there in the contract in black and white. It’s not my problem.’”
For a long time Vellinga worked for the Television Licence Fee Department in the Netherlands. After that he ran the Independent Pilot Service in Hoofdorp – an association that advised those who aspired to be pilots. The association was discontinued in 1995 because it no longer offered any obvious advantage as a legal entity. These days he acts as a broker for students who want to train as a pilot. He set up the American Support Group (ASG) for this purpose, which according to its articles of association, is based in New Castle in the American state of Delaware. Vellinga is CEO/President and his wife, Agnes N. Vellinga-Dam, is a director of the American company. The contact address in the Netherlands is Puterweg 46-1 in Garderen, which is Otto Vellinga’s home address. There is a reason why the company is based in the United States. On 1 June 1993 Vellinga started drawing weekly social security benefit of NLG 357.30 under the new Unemployment Insurance Act Every as a resident at the said address, and has continued to do so ever since. His wife also receives benefit from the Industrial Insurance Administration Office in the Netherlands, which in her case amounts to NLG 1773.93 per month. On inquiry, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) revealed that the couple own two aircraft via ASG-leasing: a single-engine Mooney M-20 (registration number N 9122 V) and a Piper Aztec (registration number N 6326 Y). The latter is a twin-engine aircraft used for multi-engine training. The two aircraft are estimated to be worth approximately a quarter of a million guilders.
ASG President Otto Vellinga places advertisements in newspapers such as De Telegraaf and aviation journals such as Piloot & Vliegtuig to attract students. Those who show an interest are male and female trainee pilots with several flight training certificates who want to gain more practical flight experience.
Vellinga refers those who want to clock up ‘heavy’ jet hours to the American Air Network based in Chesterfield in Missouri, which is presided over by Douglas Gilliland. According to information obtained from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), over a period of ten years the AAN has failed to comply with the safety regulations on nine occasions. Their offences include failing to respect work and break times, falsifying the logbooks in which the pilots are supposed to note the flying hours they have completed, and flying passenger aircraft without the necessary licence.
Last week Gilliland was in the Netherlands to recruit students together with Otto Vellinga. In a restaurant in Garderen the two outlined the advantages of commercial pilot training in the States to some fifteen potential students. In practice it all boils down to the fact that the students get to serve as co-pilots on regular freight flights – a bit like a co-driver in a truck. But they pay through the nose for the privilege. Vellinga charges each student 45,000 dollars and passes on between 6,000 and 8,000 dollars to the American Air Network. One of the students described it as pure speculation: “As far as they are concerned we are simply cheap labour. We are there on the strength of a student visa, so we are not allowed to earn money. Co-pilots normally earn 250 dollars for a five-hour flight. I earn nothing. In fact I have to pay to be there.”
It is hardly surprising that Vellinga sends his students to the States. The better weather makes for more flying hours. There are fewer flight movements in the Netherlands, which means less chance to clock up ‘heavy hours’. There is also another advantage in sending students to the States – certainly as far as Vellinga is concerned. He can then get them to sign American contracts, which makes it very difficult for them to seek redress through the Dutch courts.
A student who experienced it all first hand said, “When the American Air Network needs personnel Vellinga sends them ten students. One or two of the ten are selected – or are smart enough to get the contract changed before they sign it. They are the ones that get to fly, to the extent that you can call it that at ANN. The other eight are sent from pillar to post. Until they abandon the training. They might spend an hour and a half in the air in six months.”
This was exactly what happened to a student from Bussum. He spent six months in the States, and is now 35,000 dollars worse off – and that’s without counting the travelling and accommodation expenses which added up to 6,000 dollars. He signed the contract on 7 October of last year and was supposed to start training in Miami in December. By the end of March he had completed three thirty minute flights to Guatemala – the same destination that the fated jet was headed for. Again the instructors didn’t bother with the safety regulations. “I already had my licence, but for that particular aircraft you need training and you also need to pass exams. That never happened. The jets are extremely fast and light. A heavy gust of wind will cause them to career off the runway. Things regularly go wrong. I contacted the Federal Aviation Administration and told them ‘I don’t know what’s going on here. They want to put me in a cockpit without any training – that’s illegal.’”
When the student expressed concern to the people at ANN, they made things so difficult for him that he abandoned the training. They kept sending him from one airfield to another. Besides losing a great deal of time, the student also had to cover the travelling expenses and the cost of staying in hotels. “At a certain point you simply run out of money and decide to return to the Netherlands. Then Vellinga says, ‘You abandoned the training.’ The contract states that students who decide not to complete the training are not entitled to a refund.”
Bas Verheul from Utrecht invested 38,250 dollars in the American Support Group and left without gaining any flight training certificates. “I spent 25,000 dollars on the jet training programme, which I never completed, and 9,000 dollars on a type rating certification for a specific aircraft but was never given the training.”
Fellow student Bart travelled out the States at the beginning of December, after paying 100,000 guilders into Vellinga’s account. For that he got to log just 140 hours. “For that amount of money I could have gained all of my flight training certificates at bona fide flight training schools in the same time.
Until recently Vellinga also sent students to the Midwestern Airways flight training school in Escanaba in the state of Michigan, which ran flying courses for beginners who wished to gain their Private Pilot’s Licence. Belgian student Nele Convents (18) signed a contract with Otto Vellinga and paid him 16,800 dollars. She got to spend 26 hours in the air and three months later she returned to Belgium without having gained her licence. “Someone who travelled to the States independently and signed up with any flight training school would pay between 4,000 and 5,000 dollars for the same training,” she says. The instructors at Midwestern Airways flight training school also disregard safety regulations that are considered to be standard practice in the Netherlands. Nele Convents: “There was no VOR (a type of radio navigation system that makes it possible to determine the specific position of an aircraft) and the hydraulic system of the landing gear of one of the single-engine aircraft – a Moony M-20 – didn’t always work. On one occasion the aircraft landed on its body.”
Jan-Frans Blokland (27) from Heerjansdam arrived in Escanaba on 17 January and found the whole set up to be a shambles. He was supposed to undergo a compulsory medical examination but was told that an appointment would be made in due course. There were none of the textbooks needed for the theoretical part of the course. When officials from the Federal Aviation Administration – the agency that sees to it that safety regulations are complied with – visited the airfield, the instructor who taught the theory was out of there like a shot. Blokland: “He was actually an advanced student with 1,300 flying hours under his belt. He wasn’t a qualified instructor.”
Blokland was given his first flying lesson in an aircraft without a radio. “My Norwegian instructor stressed time and time again how dangerous that was.” Jan-Frans Blokland had dreamt of training as a pilot for years. He gave up his job and headed for the branch of the ABN-AMRO bank in Barendrecht where he asked for a loan of 250,000 guilders – enough to cover the cost of gaining a full pilot’s licence at Tulip Air, an accredited flight training school in Amstelveen. The ‘specialist’ at the ABN-AMRO head office – a Mr Zwaneveld – refused to authorise the loan and advised Blokland to train with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. He said he would be happy to authorise a loan for such an undertaking. ABN-AMRO had already referred several students to Vellinga and it had been a good move.”
Jan-Frans Blokland: “In the back of your mind you think, if ABN-AMRO is prepared to recommend it, it must be good.” Blokland went ahead on this basis. He paid an advance of 41,000 guilders into a bank account in the States and set off for Michigan on 16 January of this year. Three weeks later the Midwestern Airways flight training school, for which Vellinga’s American Support Group acted as a broker, went bust. Jan-Frans Blokland and his parents, who put up their house as security, claim that they were given misleading advice. Mr Zwaneveld has admitted that he does business with Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group, but refuses to discuss this particular case.
Midwestern Airways stopped its flight training activities after another five students had each signed a contract and paid 50,000 dollars for advanced flight training. It is probably worth noting that Midwestern Airways is run by Otto Vellinga’s daughter in law, while his son, John Vellinga, is ‘executive vice-president’ of Midwestern Airways and vice-president of the American Support Group.
People have been complaining about Otto Vellinga for years, but few have taken action against him. A student from Bussum said, “Taking action against Otto Vellinga would be an expensive business, not only in terms of money, but also in terms of time. You might win the case, but there is still no guarantee that you would get your money back. And we are all students who still have a long way to go in the world of aviation. Once you get a reputation for being difficult, you’re stuck with it. Vellinga himself also uses this as a threat. He says, ‘I’ll see to it that you never get another job as a pilot.’” Erik, the student who narrowly escaped the jet crash, says, “Douglas Gilliland of AAN, who recruits students via Vellinga, allows students to break the aviation laws, but the students then become an accessory, which makes it difficult for them to approach the aviation authorities.
In 1993, Ronald, a former student, paid Otto Vellinga 24,000 dollars for 300 flying hours on a Beach 1900. Hours that – like so many students – he never got to fly. Eventually he ran out of money and had to get his practical flight experience elsewhere. Which he did. He now works for an accredited flight training institute and is calling for greater government control. There are 25 to 30 flight training institutes in the Netherlands, which range from the KLM Flight Academy, which is recognised by the Civil Aviation Authority in the Netherlands (RLD), to outfits such as Otto Vellinga’s American Support Group. Between them they train several hundred pilots every year. Ronald: “There needs to be an independent body in the Netherlands that assesses and monitors flight training schools and brokers and certifies bona fide companies.”
Mr Leeman in Limmen, whose son was swindled a few years ago, says that things have got out of hand. “Most airlines no longer run their own flight training institutes. An airline will say, you can come and work for us but you must have at least 500 hours of flying experience and you have to get those yourself. This keeps people such as Vellinga in business.”
Nieuwe Revu invited Otto Vellinga to comment. He declined and referred us to his lawyer, Menno Stokvis. He dismisses all of the stories as ‘urban myths’. But he is not willing to refute them. ·
[caption]
This aircraft in which Erik was given flying lessons later crashed.
[quote]
Erik (29): “The theory lessons on the ground normally take a week. My instructor ran through the whole lot in half an hour.”
