On his first day working independently in the field, Bert Witte looks at his screen and sees the entire Polderbaan runway turn red. Every runway light has gone out.
“I’d never seen anything like it before. My entire system was red and I had no idea what was going on.”
Bert gets into his car and drives towards 18R, the name used internally for the Polderbaan runway. His phone starts ringing on the way. First the Flow Manager Aircraft calls, then seemingly everyone else.
“Everyone is on the phone telling you: you need to do something now.”
The system had accidentally been running on emergency power, which failed when air traffic control switched on the runway lighting. Once Bert realised what had happened, it only took a few clicks to get the lights back on.
“That was pretty stressful. You don’t forget a day like that.”
Behind the desk and out on the runway
Bert spends part of his time in the Intelligent Asset Control Center, which is staffed day and night and where technical disruptions are reported.
As an Operational Installation Manager Airside, Bert keeps an overview of the electrical systems on and around the runways. Which systems are switched on? Which are off? And is everything operating as it should?
But Bert does not spend all day behind a desk.
“When there’s an operational handover, I’ll get into one of those yellow cars and drive out there.”
Bert laughs.
“That’s when the plane spotters get a little jealous.”
Electricity that behaves differently
The electrical systems at Schiphol are highly specialised.
“At home, the voltage is fixed. On the runway, it works the other way around: the current stays constant and the voltage adjusts. That ensures that the last light is just as bright as the first.”
Everything about the system serves one purpose.
“Aircraft must always be able to take off and land. If there’s an interruption somewhere, the system increases the voltage until the circuit is complete again. Those passengers need to reach the ground safely.”
When you work at Schiphol, Bert says, you do not always stop to think about it. To people outside the airport, Schiphol and an airline such as KLM can sometimes seem like the same organisation.
“When KLM goes on strike, people think I won’t have anything to do either. But we’re not responsible for the pilots or the aircraft. We take care of everything around them. In my case, everything related to airfield lighting systems.”
A workplace you won't find anywhere else
This kind of work only exists at an airport. It is what makes Bert a specialist.
“It’s electrical engineering and physics, but on a scale that’s almost impossible to imagine.”
For new colleagues, the technology itself is not necessarily the hardest part.
“Schiphol is huge. Where do I need to be? Who do I contact for what? People often spend longer figuring that out than understanding the technology.”
That does not mean disappearing into the crowd.
“Even in an organisation this large, there’s space to do your own thing. People see what you contribute.”
And Bert's favourite part of the job? No two days are the same. Neither is the view.
“In the morning, we sit down with a coffee and watch the aircraft taxi past the window. If a Beluga or a C-17 comes along, everyone gets up to have a look. That’s our office.”