(Updated 4/12/2017)

On Assignment with Saudia
By Jon Proctor


When President Franklin Roosevelt gave a C-47 (DC-3) to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1945, TWA was selected to provide management assistance to the newly formed Saudi Arabian Airlines, later known as Saudia. Over the years, our airline helped to build it into a proud flag carrier, providing training and personnel, especially in the areas of maintenance and flight operations. Thousands of TWAers completed temporary duty assignments, mainly at the Jeddah base.

In 1975, Saudia began receiving its first widebody jets, Lockheed L-1011s. The airline requested help in training cabin crews that would include an In Flight Supervisor (IFS), to be modeled after our DCS position. To make this happen, six TWA DCSs were recruited for 6-month assignments that included training the initial Saudia crews at Breech Academy, visiting the Lockheed factory at Palmdale, California plus hands-on instruction at the Jeddah base and on-board L-1011 flights.

The group, informally called "the Saudia Six," included:

Tom Fitzgerald

Bob Henderson

Dale Kreimer

Bruce Megenhardt

Frank Messina

Tim Taylor

Tasked with sitting up on-board service procedures, safety qualifications and other facets of the job, these men completed their assignments in December 1975.

class

Pictured with Saudia employees and Breech instructors, Bruce Megenhardt, Bob Henderson and Frank Messina are in the top row, left.



bamtim

Bruce Megenhardt and Tim Taylor pose at Lockheed's Palmdale facility,

before riding the delivery flight of Saudia's first L-1011, to Jeddah via

Bangor and London.

But Saudia's rapid growth brought additional Tri-Stars into the fleet, which would eventually total 18 airplanes, and it became obvious that additional management assistance was needed to keep up with expanded widebody service. As a result, the call went out for more TWAers to assist, and over the next few years more temporary assignments were taken up by members of our group, including:

John Bracken

Darwin Bremer

Gordon Briers

Joe Collins

Bill Gould

Don Hubbard

Franco Innocenti

John Izzo

Alan Johnson

Ray Kral

Clive Miller

Chip Sloan

Larry Smith

Gene Van Naarden

Other non-DCS TWAers included Robert Randell, Bob Estrada and Gerard Miston.

lhrkd

Above: Check-in at Saudia's London-Heathrow ticket counter; carry-on luggage was even more challenging.

Below: Saudia's Jeddah headquarters building.

asdfas

 

sdgfs


Frank Messina, Henry Stahli, Tom Fitzgerald and Dale Kreimer enjoy a

ginger ale in a Jeddah hotel room.

 

asd

Tom Fitzgerald, Bob Henderson, Dale Kreimer and Tim Taylor at Karachi.

 

fasfda

Bob Henderson and Tom Fitzgerald pose with a Saudia hostess in front of a

Tri-Star movie screen.

 

asdf

In-cabin pet regulations were a bit different on Saudia.

 

asda

Falcon hunting brought passengers to Saudia, complete with falcons!

Bob Henderson, above, seems intrigued with a passenger and his bird,

while Larry Smith, below, enjoys the moment.

adsf

asdf

Bob Henderson, on the L-2 door jumpseat.

 

sfgsdf

Clive Miller and Larry Smith.

 

asdfasd

It wasn't all work. Above, Dale Kreimer, Frank Messina and Bob Henderson

get ready for some scuba-diving, while John Izzo, below, displays a 15-lb. barracuda he pulled from the Red Sea.

afsdfasdf

 

qerwe

Tim Taylor and Frank Messina posing on an abandoned Jeep in Jeddah.

London Base

747

"Golf-Hotel" (OD-AGH), is readied for departure at Riyadh. Jetways were yet to come at Kingdom airports.

asdfas

 

As Saudia continued expanding, two Boeing 747s were leased from Middle East Airlines (MEA) from June 1977, to be staffed with MEA pilots and a basic MEA cabin crew, plus a Jeddah-based Saudi purser and two Saudia hostesses from the newly opened London base.

At TWA, an opening was posted for twelve 18-month IFS assignments at LHR. Selected were:

Gil Bernal

Ray Campbell

Tom Donahue

Gordon Humpherys

Svein Husevold

Alan Johnson (transferred from Jeddah)

Paul McGowan

Frank Messina

Jon Proctor

Bob Trotter

Bob Van Well

Jerry Warkans

(Ed Canzonieri and Robert Randell later joined the London base)

 

The 747s were flown over just a few routes: London-Riyadh, Riyadh-Cairo-Jeddah and a once-weekly Riyadh-Beirut roundtrip. Karachi was added later. Patterns were typically five and eight days duration, In addition, charters were carried out to transport school teachers between the Kingdom and Egypt. During the winter months, London-Riyadh flights stopped at either Geneva or Rome. Annual Hajj charters were not assigned to the jumbos although pilgrim groups were carried on some of the 747 flights.

asdfa

 

asdf

Above: Ray Campbell, Svein Husevold, Bob Trotter (front), Jon Proctor and

Frank Messina enjoy a cool soft drink at Bob Henderson's villa, while in Jeddah

on their indoctrination visit.

Below: Don Hubbard (center) enjoys a laugh or two with Frank and Svein.

asdfadsfasd

aasdfsd

A later photo, sometime in the early 1980s, at Jeddah. Left to right, top: Gil Bernal, Paul Statler, Franco Innocenti, Joe Connery and Ron Watson. Below: Robert Randell
and Bob Van Well. Joe and Ron were hired from outside of the TWA ranks. The ladies
are unidentified.

 

 

asd

Jon Proctor at Cairo with MEA crew members Michel Khalifeh and his wife Hadia.

 

747bey

Golf-Hotel is towed to the gate at Beirut for its return flight to Riyadh.

 

asdaf

Jon Proctor and and MEA hostess Dalal Sinno, at the R-5 door, wearing the new
Saudia uniforms
.

Saudia eventually completed its program to train Saudi nationals as In Flight Sueprvisors and the TWA DCS assignments came to an end. All who participated agreed that the experience was unique, and most definitely a character builder!

 

Epilogue

At the September 16-17, 2011 DCS Alumni Association reunion in Denver, members who served with Saudia posed for photos.

fasdfsd

London-based alums Svein Husevold, Tom Donahue, Jon Proctor, Jerry Warkans, Allan Johnson and Paul McGowan

asdfsdfasd

The London group is joined by two of the Saudia Six, Bob Henderson (far left) and Dale Kreimer (fourth from left).