Six Boeing 747-400s that have been parked at Twente Airport since spring are now causing serious problems for Lufthansa. The airport has permission to land jumbo jets, but take-offs are not permitted. Apparently neither the crane nor the airport knew anything about this.

A recycling company is based in Twente, so that actual “one-way landings” occur more often there. Lufthansa does not want to stretch the six Boeing 747-400s into the scrap press, but rather transfer them to the Mojave Desert to store them there. According to local media reports, this is precisely what turns out to be a tangible problem, because Boeing 747s are not even allowed to take off in Twente.

Twente Airport has made serious allegations against the Dutch aviation authority ILT in the newspaper “Tubantia”, claiming that it unilaterally changed the license. If there is no relenting, they will go to court. The boss simply calls the situation “absurd”. The agency, on the other hand, has security concerns. How this will develop and whether Lufthansa will get the six Boeing 747-400s out of Twente by air remains to be seen.