Thunderflash of the KLu

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Dutch Thunderflashes , assigned to nr. 306 Squadron ,were at first based at Laarbruch in Germany. Later on they moved to Deelen AB in Holland.

Iin 1962 the unit moved to Volkel to start conversion to the RF-104G Starfighter; the remainder of the 24 Flashes (7 had crashed in the meantime) were transferred to Greece and Turkey. The last Thunderflash to leave Holland was P-15, who left in January 1964 with destination Turkish Air Force.

The Thunderflashes only served for seven years within the KLu. They were supplied under the MDAP support plan (which basically means that they were in Holland on a loan basis and that the aircraft remained property of the United States of America.).
Initially they flew in a metal finish livery, with the 306 squadron code TP- painted on the nose. Later on some of them were camouflaged with black TP codes, and from 1959 onwards all of them were gradually camouflaged and the P-registration appeared on the nose of the aircraft (P-1 up to P-24).

Currently we still have two Thunderflashes which are preserved in the Netherlands.
The best known is a former Greek Air Force machine (U.S. s/n 51-11253), that was flown to Holland in 1988; by that time the Greek Air Force was phasing them out in favour of the RF-4 Phantom. This particular RF-84F(which was initially delivered to the Dutch Air Force in 1956 !) has been donated to the Royal Netherlands Air Force Museum. It is now on permanent exhibition in the museum at Soesterberg.
The second one(U.S. s/n 53-7644) is a former Belgian Air Force aircraft (ex FR-31), which previously served with the German Luftwaffe. It is now on display near the Oranjekazerne in Schaarsbergen, painted up as “P-7″ in Dutch colours.

The Thunderflashes in Dutch Air Force-service have not often been photographed, and pictures of those aircraft , made by spotters , don’t even exist , as far as we know. Therefore you will only find official photos in this gallery, some of which have never been published before!

A site with lots of interesting information on Dutch Thunderflashes is www.the306sqn.com by Ton Smilde.