"I was born in Deurne (Antwerp, Belgium) and remember how sensational it was to watch aeroplanes during the 1950s.
When my father bought a car in the 1960s and I acquired my first camera, we made sunday outings to the airport at Zaventem.
In 1971 I had my first flight: in an Air Spain DC-8-21 (EC-BZQ 'Isla de Gran Canaria') from Brussels to Mallorca .
At Antwerp I was allowed to help handle the charter flights at for Jersey.
The aviation bug really caught on then!

Delta Air Transport (DAT) was founded at Antwerp and a few enthusiasts created the Delta Fan Club (DFC); I became one of the first members.
We flew DAT to meetings or museums abroad, sometimes in a DC-6 or a CV440 ConvairLiner; for us DFC members separate tickets were issued, they were handwritten. I still got one!
DFC became the ASA: Aviation Society of Antwerp. As such helped organize for 12 years the annual Stampe Fly In even; and for 20 years I was actively engaged in this aviation society.

I was also co-founder of the Stampe & Vertongen Museum at Antwerp airport. The first aircraft to have been put in place there I' ve helped to relocate with a truck from Midden-Zeeland airfield and for years I' ve helped restoring WW I replica aircraft, together with the people of De Vroege Vogels from Lelystad, Netherlands.
One will also find my name at the plaque placed cpmmemmorating the opening of the museum.

I have also worked for several years for Air BP. I had 28 years of experience hauling a fueltrucks internationally and they needed a driver at the airport. That was at a time when I intended to take things easy, but it turned out differently.
Three years ago I suffered a brain seizure and I was done driving a car and could no longer go out visiting air shows and airports.
At one time I worked in shipbuilding and probably would have continued that line of work had the wharf not been shut down. Since I live near a harbortown I have picked up photography of ships. But when an airplane flies overhead I cannot but look up…
I was never cured from the aviation bug."

Photos © Frans Truyens

Convair CV440 OH-VKN, preserved Museo Nacional de Aéropuertos y Transporte Aéreo, Malaga (Spain). Photo taken 08Feb013.
Frans added the following history of this aircraft (certain data corrected or added from 'The Convairliners Story' by Air-Britain, 1997):
'This aircraft is not the original OH-VKN! The construction number (c/n) is 503 and it was first delivered on 19Feb1958 as SE-BSY (named 'Assur Viking') to SAS.
It was declared 'without further use' (WFU) at Copenhagen in Dec.1975. 10Mar1976 it was bought & registered as A2-BSY for Botswana Desert Airways. The owner was AVNA Airways.
In May 1976 it was registered as ZS-JVO to National Air Charter in South Africa. And in 1978 rereg'd A2-ABH on a lease by Kalahari Air Services / National Airways.
On 15Aug79 it joined Cochise Airlines in the USA, as N8042W. Its registration was changed on 22Nov82, putting down the owner as Flight Trails Inc., of Carlsbad,NM. And on 12Mar84 to Whispering Palms Resort (Air Resort Airlines).
Again declared WFU, it was stored at Carlsbad on 31May2000.

This aircraft ended up in Málaga, still wearing its American tailnumber, but unable to state the year it made the transfer to Spain.
And at some point it was made over in its present livery and OH-VKN tailnumber.
The original OH-VKN of KAR-AIR (c/n 497), allegedly, was the first charter (in 1975) to land at Málaga's airport. Hence the tribute.'

See also my photos here at the museum, including interior photos of CV440 OH-VKN: ANDALUSIA - 2024

Aad van der Voet provided these details of its history:
"Even though this aircraft is painted as PH-VLA, it is in fact N9888A, c/n 04534.
This is ex Moroccan Air Force CN-MBA and it was acquired by Euroworld/Visionair (Jeff Hawke) as N9888A in the late 1970s. It was stored at Malaga in 1979, and it was never to leave...
Initially its condition was allowed to deteriorate, but later it was placed on display near the airport terminal in anonymous colours, without titles or registration.
In 1998 it was acquired by the Museo Nacional de Aéropuertos y Transporte Aéreo, and in late 1999 they painted it in Martin's Air Charter colours as 'PH-VLA', to honour the airline that had been so important to its airport and its tourism industry.

Martin's Air Charter's real PH-VLA was not a DH.104 Dove, but a DH.114 Heron: c/n 14050. This aircraft was sold in 1964, and eventually became a Saunders ST-27 conversion in Canada. It was broken up in the early or mid 1980s.

There was one other 'PH-VLA'.
In May 1961 DH.104 Dove c/n 04184 became PH-VLC, but it was accidentally painted as PH-VLA. This was of course soon corrected to PH-VLC. This aircraft eventually ended up in Senegal as 6V-ACM, fate unknown."

My page Photos by Friends & Guest (16) shows this Dove in 1994 when it graced the lawn at the Air Terminal of Malaga airport; it was later repainted in the livery of Martinair (Amsterdam,NL-based airline which ceased its short haul pax charter flights on 01Nov08. Malaga-AGP played a dominant role in its history of holiday flights, ever since Martinair was founded in 1958).
Faded glory, but refusing to die!
(See also Martinair in Changed Livery gallery).

Herman Dekker has a remark on his website that when DH.104 Dove was delivered the tailnumber PH-VLA was applied by mistake and changed to PH-VLC 'asap'!

You may also find this amusing to read: Memories by Hans Beunk on Cameroon Air Transport and DH Dove PH-MAD

This was published on Facebook by 'Flo Ze' from Belgium. Sad to see it this way, but not without hope, yet..

DeHavilland DH-104 Dove 7A, c/n 04534 at Malaga
www.airport-data.com/aircraft/N9888A

SEE MY ANDALUSIA 2024 REPORT WHICH INCLUDES THE MALAGA MUSEUM & this Dove 'PH-VLA'

Ilyushin IL-18 EX 75466, Phoenix - Antwerp, sep. 2003
There is a story here to tell-
"EX-75466 arrived at Antwerp on 03Ssep03, non-stop from Riyadh (Saudi Arabia). It was meant to pick up a load of disgarded phonebooks. A 737-200 had been planned but due to noise restrictions this IL-18 had been sent over.
It is supposedly the only IL-18 converted to have a cargodoor, modification carried out in the open air at Sharjah!
I was allowed to have a look inside and found that the forward fuselage offered cargo space while the aft still had seats, a combi version so to speak; there were several luxury items put in there too.
The cargo was delayed and everybody took a peek inside: customs, police, airport authorities, etc.
Anyway.
After three days the Ilyushin plane left: empty. Two people in long flowing robes were left behind. The police said that this wasn't the first time people were left behind.
The crew ordered the fuel service to fill all the tanks but the refueller asked them if they had considered the length of runway here at Antwerp and they decided to take (much) less. The flightplan showed a stop at Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
Never saw this plane again."

I used to be meticulously documenting where, what and when I made the photos and as such transferred my data to the personal computer, but a computer crash without proper back up made has erased most of my log reports. From memory I can recollect most locations but dates are often a problem.

The above information is courtesy Jack Wolbrink's website, where you'll find more detailed information on PH-MAG, on Moormanair as well on the DC-3 / C-47.
Nice to see, among Jack's information, parts of this aircraft survive to this day: "..some parts of the aircraft are present in the RAF Museum Cosford and the nose section is on display in the RAF Museum Hendon." Click the links to see reports of my visits to these museums.