In his long career as a pipe worker, William Poppe helped build no fewer than 51 ships. He and his team are currently preparing work on his fifty-second ship: the superyacht Here Comes the Sun, for which Damen Schelde Naval Shipbuilding in Vlissingen-Oost will be building a new stern in collaboration with Damen Yachting.

HNLMS Callenburgh HNLMS Callenburgh

“The very first ship that I was able to build towards the end of the 1970s was HLNMS Callenburgh, the second in a series of no fewer than 12 S-class frigates of the Kortenaerklasse that De Schelde built for the Royal Netherlands Navy around that time,” says William. “That was a great time. So many people worked on that ship, you just fell into insignificance in that crowd. But De Schelde also had almost 3,000 employees at the time! I worked in the well-known department 806 of Scheepsnieuwbouw (ship newbuilding), which dealt with everything that had to do with propulsion.”

"I came straight from school and when you see that 698 guilders on your pay slip, then you are happy."

In those years De Schelde was so busy that as a pipe worker you “went from ship to ship,” says William. He recalls that he could hardly believe his eyes when he got his first payslip (“I still have it.”). Starting as an apprentice at the Business School in 1976, he was immediately on the payroll. That was normal practice in those days. “I came straight from school and when you see that 698 guilders on your pay slip, then you are happy.”

F830 HLNMS Tjerk Hiddes F830 HLNMS Tjerk Hiddes

He has the best memories of the construction of HLNMS Tjerk Hiddes (construction number 366), the third in a series of eight Multipurpose Frigates built between 1991-1995. “We then made a trial run of nine weeks. That was in 1992. We did, with the Gulf Stream, a seven-week ‘tour of America’; from Tenerife via Antiga, Florida and Key West to Bermuda and then to England and back to Vlissingen. What a time! Hans van de Sande, also a real 806 man, was there too. ”

He has never disliked his job. “But that urge for technology was there early on. As a boy it was my hobby to tinker with cars and motorcycles, well then at De Schelde you were immediately in your place in the engine room. I grew up with it: from fixing a tyre to taking apart an engine block.”

In 2002 William was promoted to pipe working foreman.

He was part of the team that built the hull of the JSS HNLMS Karel Doorman in Romania and was also there when the flagship of the Royal Netherlands Navy was completed at Vlissingen Oost. “What a ship that was. The Karel Doorman was a ship that made you feel wow. If you stood at the railing on the thirteenth deck, you looked down several dozen meters. That made an impression. It was a ship to get lost in…”

William was sent to Indonesia (2014) where he lived with his wife for 2.5 years, and to Mexico (2017 to the end of 2019) to build respectively the two Indonesian PKR frigates and the Mexican frigate ARM Juárez, ex-ARM Reformador .

“I’ve always had a good time, even though there have been times when you had to work overtime five days a week, sometimes four hours a day and also show up on Saturdays … You always work towards the moment that those motors start turning, you want to hear that sound; the sound of the engines to which all the piping is attached: the heart of the ship.”

Next year William hopes to celebrate his 45th anniversary. In that long career he has been on twenty sea trials, but he missed that of the Karel Doorman. “I had been on vacation and came back on a Monday, but it was precisely that day that she had left for the sea trial…”