The Night I Disrupted a Danish Airliner Schedule
May 29, 2012
The Night I Disrupted a Danish Airliner Schedule
In the mid-1960’s I was dabbling in aquarium fishes and my then boss, Dr. Herbert R. Axelrod, sent me to Denmark on some related business. A final task on that trip was to visit Colonel Jorgen Scheel to pick up some African cyprinodonts for Dr. Axelrod. The colonel had collected them in the Congo and was breeding them in his Copenhagen home.
On the eve of my scheduled departure from Denmark I was to be the guest of the colonel and his wife. I arrived in time for dinner and it was delicious. Then there were sweets and cigars but all I could see was the ticking clock. Then he showed me his extensive collection of rare African fundulus and other killifishes but I by now I was hearing the airport announcer calling the number of my flight. Then the Colonel netted the various pairs of fishes for Dr. Axelrod and put them in Thermos jars but all I could envision was that airplane on the taxiway aimed at America with me not on it. Then there was a leisurely goodbye drink of Aquavit but I was already making plans to get a hotel for the night and another flight on another day.
The Colonel and his wife did eventually bid me a fond farewell and only then I saw, pulled up at his front porch, a sedan with Danish Army markings on it. A soldier jumped out, took my luggage, helped me in, and we drove off to the airport. We drove to a guarded gate. Two soldiers promptly opened the gate and we drove right across the airport runways to a lighted plane with its loading ramp down and its cabin door open. The other passengers were all settled in. Soldiers helped me on board with my luggage. No luggage was checked. No one ever asked to see what was in my Thermos jars or my ticket or visa or passport, I was not frisked or x-rayed, I didn’t even take off my shoes. The soldiers just helped me board the plane and then saluted and departed.
The aircraft door closed as a stewardess showed me to my seat and the plane immediately took off albeit delayed about a half-hour.
I later mentioned the Colonel’s name and was told that he was not only a Danish Colonel but he (or his wife) was also a member of the Danish Royal Family. The plane quickly made up the half-hour delay and I got home on schedule. And that’s the way it was with Ichthyology back in the good old days.
M F Roberts