Victor, Jan and Martin are present as the sculpture arrives prior to its installation

Yellow Pages Hiking   Aventura Wandern auf Teneriffa Tenerife Hiking, Rambling, Walking

They were among the 583 dead in the crash that caused what is still the largest number of fatalities, not counting ground fatalities, in the history of worldwide aviation.  He lost his parents, his two sisters, his brother in law and two nephews in the blink of an eye.

He was just 20 years old and working for EMI in Amsterdam, “I became an adult in ten seconds” and the house where he had lived with his family, “became gigantic and empty”.  Showing an enormous strength of character and thanks to the support of his 86 year old grandmother, “an unbelievably strong woman” he learned to live with the pain, “you have to continue your life”.  The accident had an “enormous impact” on Jan’s life and may be the reason why he can’t abide to waste time, everything he becomes involved in is carried through with 100 per cent effort.

As the years and anniversaries went by without any kind of official ceremony, he decided to direct his energies to create a forum for families and friends of the deceased to meet together and grieve and honour their loved ones.

In January 2002, with the help of Victor Depous and Martin Noordzij, whose only connection to the accident is their friendship with Jan, they formed the Foundation Relatives Victims Tenerife.  The first commemoration, the 25th anniversary was held the same year in Amsterdam with almost 1,000 people taking part.  From that day the idea grew to place a permanent monument in Tenerife to the victims and all those who worked in the rescue teams, medical teams etc.  They felt it was needed by everyone involved, “it’s historical, you can’t just cover it over with sand and pretend it never happened” Jan insisted.

After a reconnaissance visit, they contacted island authorities via the Dutch Foreign Office and were welcomed by the La Laguna mayor, Ana Oromas, the President of the Regional Government, Adán Martín and island President, Ricardo Melchior who agreed to the project with one condition, the monument sculpture should be by a famous Dutch artist.  The sculpture has now been installed on a hillside overlooking La Laguna at Mesa Mota by Cabildo workmen who impressed them very much by working, “even during Carnaval”.

On the 30th anniversary of the accident at 12 o’clock the Foundation is hosting a commemoration service in the Auditorium, the sculpture is to be officially unveiled at 4.45pm and a two minutes silence will be observed at the same hour the accident took place, 5.06pm.  All those whose lives were touched in any way by this tragedy are invited to take part.

The Tenerife disaster

On 27 March, 1977 583 people died when two Jumbos crashed into each other on the Los Rodeos runway.  The accident caused the highest number of fatalities, not including ground fatalities, of any accident in the history of aviation.

Several planes were diverted from Gran Canaria to Los Rodeos that day due to a bomb threat by Canarian separatist terrorists.  One bomb had exploded in the airport concourse and a threat of a second had been received.  At 12.30pm Victor Grubbs, the Captain of Pan Am Flight 1736 out of Los Angeles International Airport, received an urgent message from control advising him of the bomb and ordering him to divert to Los Rodeos.  At 1.38pm the KLM Royal Dutch Airlines 4805 from Amsterdam is also diverted to the north tinerfeñan airport, it landed ahead of the Pan Am plane.  Three other diverted airplanes were already on the ground, they were all parked on the long taxiway so departing aircraft had to taxi along the runway to get into position for take off.

Los Rodeos airport at that time was smaller and the aircraft controllers were not used to dealing with so many aircraft at the same time and especially not Jumbo jets.  It was also a Sunday, so only two controllers were on duty.  The KLM passengers disembarked and all but one went into the airport lounge to relax, Robina van Lanschot, a travel guide and Tenerife resident chose not to reboard the plane.

At 2.15pm the Pan Am 747 touched down and fifteen minutes later the police in Gran Canaria confirmed that they'd cleared the bomb.  The KLM crew had decided to fuel the plane to save time in Gran Canaria and although the American flight still had all its passengers on board and was ready to take off, it was unable to do so because the Dutch plane and a refuelling vehicle were blocking their exit.  Filling the Jumbo with 55,000 litres of fuel took just over half an hour and they then had to reboard their 234 passengers and the rest of the 14 crew members.  The Pan Am plane had no option but to wait.

At four minutes to five, KLM's most senior Captain, Jacob van Zanten, requested permission to taxi and received the go ahead from the tower two minutes later.  The plane was instructed to taxi to the end of the runway, make a 180º turn and await clearance for take off.  In aviation terms this is a backtrack or backtaxi and very difficult with a 747 on a narrow runway.  By now fog had reduced the visibility to 305 metres, the controllers couldn't see the planes, there was no ground radar and they were relying completely on radio communication.

At two minutes past five, the Pan Am flight was instructed to taxi along the same runway behind the KLM.  They then receive instructions to take the third exit on their left and wait.  The exits weren't numbered and the Pan Am airport chart didn't mark them by number either.  As they had already passed the first turnoff, analysis of the cockpit voice recorder implies that they believed they were being directed to the C4 turning, which was a 45º turn and not where the controllers really wanted them at C3 which was a 135º turn, a difficult manoeuvre for such a huge plane.  Visibility was dropping by the second, the pilot and co-pilot didn't know the airport and they could hardly see out of their cockpit windows.

By 5.04pm the KLM was ready for takeoff and the pilot gunned up the engines but banked them down again after being told that they hadn't yet received the ATC clearance (the route they were to take once airborn).  The ATC clearance was given and it is possible that the pilot mistook the call for permission for take off, at 5.06pm he released the brakes and started off down the runway - the Pan Am flight was still taxing towards them.  Both planes tried to communicate with the tower at the same time, the Pan Am was reporting that they were still taxing and the KLM co-pilot announced either, “we are at take off” or “we are taking off” the heavy Dutch accent makes it difficult to be clear.  The coincidence of the radio communications caused mutual interference and neither message got through.

The Pam Am flight was instructed to, “report when runway clear” and the crew replied, “Ok, we'll report when we're clear”.  On hearing this, the KLM flight engineer expressed his concern to the Captain twice that the Pan Am was not clear of the runway, but was overruled by his senior.  The KLM accelerated towards the Pan Am plane which was just 1,400 metres ahead.  At 5.06 and 18 seconds, the control tower told the KLM plane that it should wait, but the instruction is ignored and the Captain continued to accelerate down the runway.  Twenty seven seconds later Pan Am's co-pilot spotted the 300,000 kilo KLM Jumbo thundering straight towards them.  The American pilot opened his throttle to full and pulled sharply to the left to try and avoid a collision and the KLM tried an immediate climb, scraping the tail of the plane along the runway for 20 metres.  At 5.06 and 50 seconds, the lower fuselage of the KLM plane smacked into the upper fuselage of the Pan Am plane at 290 kilometres an hour, ripping the plane apart almost directly above the wing.  The KLM slammed down 150 metres away from the collision point and slid down the runway, everyone on board was killed.

Fifty six passengers and five crew from the Pan Am aircraft survived, 326 passengers and nine crew lost their lives, mainly from the fire and explosions caused by the fuel spilt in the crash.  A journalist from the BBC on site just a few hours after the crash reported, “the pictures can portray graphically the horror here on the runway at Tenerife airport what they can't portray is the stink that purveys this airfield, the stink of smouldering fuselage and of burned bodies which is still here several hours after the accident.  Normally this long after a crash like this the work of clearing up has already begun, but so extensive is the accident here, the damage, that it's going to be many days before this airfield ceases to show the scars of the world's worst air accident, caused almost inadvertently by a bomb 50 miles away from this spot.”

Huge changes were instigated as a result of the accident to improve safety, but it wasn't the first accident in fog from Los Rodeos nor the last.  155 tourists from west Germany lost their lives in 1972 during take-off and a flight from Manchester in 1980 turned flew into the mountain losing 146 lives attempting to land in foggy conditions at the northern airport.  As a result, a new airport was built in the south where foggy conditions are very rare and the northern airport is now equipped with radar.

Monuments to commemorate the dead have been built in Westminster, California and in the Westgaarde cemetery in Amsterdam and on the 25^th anniversary of the crash a moving, private ceremony and reunion was held in Amsterdam.  Almost a thousand people, friends and family of those who died turned up, including a whole new generation who never knew their grandparents, uncles and aunts or cousins but according to Jan Groenewoud, president of the Foundation Relatives Victims Tenerife, “they too feel the pain”.  It was during that reunion, the first of its kind, that the need for meeting, sharing experiences and grief and having some sort of commemoration was recognised.  A permanent monument in Tenerife was suggested and found wide support among the almost thousand people who turned up for the first ceremony and on March 27, the first monument here to the victims of what has become known as the Tenerife disaster will be unveiled on Montaña Mesa Mota in La Laguna.

A gift of the Foundation Relatives Victims Tenerife, it is the work of Rudi van de Wint, a celebrated Dutch builder, sculptor and painter who died suddenly in 2006.  This, his last work, was finished by his son.  Among his more famous pieces are wall murals in the second chamber of the Dutch Government and a painted ceiling in the royal palace at The Hague.  The spiral staircase sculpture that has been designed for this monument in Corten steel is one metre wide and 18 metres high.  Encapsulating the spiral as a symbol of infinity, the sculpture appears to be moving endlessly upwards, but the spiralling movement of the staircase has been abruptly interrupted, cut off suddenly like the victims' lives and the choice of the site on the mountainside seems to give it contact with the heavens above it.

By Sheila Collis

Gallery: Crash commemoration

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