iscover
Issue 117: May 1996
Death of a Legend
Fokker, the longest surviving aircraft manufacturer, is dead. How and why it is dead is an incredible story considering the company enjoyed one of its best sales years ever in 1995. It is difficult to comprehend why Fokker should die, complete with a very healthy order book, when so many other companies stumble on with non-existent yield, continuing losses and second-rate aircraft programmes. To say that writing about the death of Anthony Fokker’s dream is personally saddening is the understatement of the century. Whilst my first ever flight was on a Butler DC-3, I remember well travelling as a wide-eyed child aboard the first F27s in Australia. This writer has visited Fokker’s Amsterdam facilities on numerous occasions, always had a close relationship with its representatives over the past two decades and most recently flew in the Fokker 70 late last year when it visited Australia. To imagine that this 77-year heritage has been killed outright when it boasted nearly two billion Australian dollars in outstanding firm orders is something that to my perhaps simple mind defies a logical explanation. To say the closure of Fokker is unnecessarily heavy-handed, inopportune and incredibly short-sighted – indeed just plain dumb — is perhaps fair comment from any rational person.
Here you had a company, a major technology-based company that has always been a significant high-tech employer and export earner for the Netherlands, abandoned just when the international jetliner market is coming alive (and you have a winning product) and you have a massive order book of some 65 aircraft! If you feel somewhere along the line you have missed something in all this then you are not alone!
This content is available exclusively to Australian Aviation members.
A monthly membership is only $5.99 or save with our annual plans.
- Australian Aviation quarterly print & digital magazines
- Access to In Focus reports every month on our website
- Unlimited access to all Australian Aviation digital content
- Access to the Australian Aviation app
- Australian Aviation quarterly print & digital magazines
- Access to In Focus reports every month on our website
- Access to our Behind the Lens photo galleries and other exclusive content
- Daily news updates via our email bulletin
- Unlimited access to all Australian Aviation digital content
- Access to the Australian Aviation app
- Australian Aviation quarterly print & digital magazines
- Access to In Focus reports every month on our website
- Access to our Behind the Lens photo galleries and other exclusive content
- Daily news updates via our email bulletin
Want to see more stories from trusted news sources?
Make Australian Aviation a preferred news source on Google.
Click here to add Australian Aviation as a preferred news source.
