BOKKENRIJDERS BACKGROUND De Limburger. By Ronald Colée June 8, 2026 photos: Ermindo Armino, Marcel van Hoorn, Ineke/Ruud. A drone-show with an airport, a hotel, and two highways nearby is quite a challenge! Will the drones fly or not? That is the big question occupying visitors to the Bokkenrijders musical in Maastricht, now that the weather isn't really cooperating. Time to take a look at the drone pilots from FlyingStars. "Above wind force 5 or in pouring rain, they stay on the ground." He actually wanted a thousand of them, because that would have made for a nicer pitch: one goat, ten horses, a hundred actors, and a thousand drones. However, it ended up being only six hundred. "With a thousand 'flying pixels,' the formations and images become too large, and you need too large a flying area." Six hundred drones—producer Servé Hermans of the Bokkenrijders musical in Maastricht doesn't mind. He is thrilled that it was even possible to incorporate drones into his spectacle. After all, something like this has never been seen before in the Netherlands. And the Maastricht native certainly enjoys pioneering. "When we started working on Bokkenrijders, one of the first myths and legends we heard—that these robbers supposedly flew through the air on goats—was sent by the devil himself. How do you portray that? For an indoor performance, you might think of holograms, but outdoors that becomes more difficult. While brainstorming at the Greek restaurant, production manager Roos Aerts and I were reminded of those drone shows in China that pop up on all sorts of social media during New Year's. The very next day, we started Googling." The duo ended up at FlyingStars in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, and immediately discovered that a drone show is quite an undertaking. Especially when two highways and an airport are just a stone's throw away. "There weren't really clear regulations yet. Are you even allowed to fly near a highway? Doesn't that distract motorists too much? And how big does the area need to be that you cordon off, in case one falls out of the sky? Finding answers to those kinds of questions took a lot of time. Because for the best effect, you can only fly when it is dark AND the airport is closed. Because normally those things fly at an altitude of 100 to 150 meters." Music He also had to take a maximum flight duration into account. "These drones run on batteries and can fly for a maximum of fifteen to twenty minutes. That is why we build in a safety margin of about twelve or thirteen minutes. Using the drones multiple times during the show is therefore not an option. Additionally, together they sound like a large electric shaver, so you have to add music on top of that, because spoken text, for example, gets lost in the sound." What Hermans also discovered after two performances is that the drones attract so much attention from the audience that they pull out their phones en masse to take photos. "You can't stop that, but it is too distracting. We therefore shortened the drone show slightly starting from the third performance, so the focus shifted back to actress Suzan Seegers." An additional factor to consider in Maastricht turned out to be the adjacent hotel, which meant the show could not take place exactly in the middle above the stage. “And taking off from the parking lot near the away section of the stadium wasn't an option either, because the drones' reception signal is too weak there. So that's where we've just stabled the horses for now.” However, most of the coordination has to take place with air traffic control at Maastricht Aachen Airport, the airport in Beek. “We eventually agreed on a time slot from 22:30 to 23:00 during which we are allowed to fly. But during the dress rehearsal on Monday, there was a major airport strike in Belgium, which meant another aircraft had to divert to Maastricht and we postponed the drone show. And during the premiere, a cargo flight was scheduled for 22:55, which we managed to move forward by half an hour after consultation with the airline.” FlyingStars Time to take a look at the FlyingStars' own drone team, which started preparing the landing platform two hours before the performance. "We are laying down a hundred plastic plates here, each with six drones on it," says Ronja Donsbach of the Gelsenkirchen-based company, founded four years ago, which is present in Maastricht with eight people. "The first show we ever performed was depicting the number 60 with fifty drones for a birthday. Now, the minimum number you can book is a hundred drones and the maximum is six hundred. Because even more drones, especially in such a densely populated area, take up too much space. You mainly only see shows with five or six thousand drones in Asia anymore." The designers from the company for Servé Hermans and Toneelgroep Maastricht have come up with approximately twelve figures. From a devil's head to a heart, and from flames to a highwayman. “What do they cost? About 1,000 euros each. What do they weigh? About 300 grams each,” says Donsbach’s colleague Erwin Wilms. “And normally we fly at an altitude of 120 meters, but because of the airport, we stay below 90 meters here.” Exactly one pilot is needed to fly all the drones. “Everything is pre-programmed,” says Donsbach. “We can keep the drones hovering motionless in the air and form images by simply changing the lights, we can make them fly and assume various formations, and we can choose a mix of both. In all colors and at different intensities. From dimmed to bright.” The speed of the drones is 5 meters per second, and the distance between the drones in the air is approximately 1.5 meters. “During takeoff, we turn on the lights for a very brief moment, then we turn them off, and once they are all in position, we let the first image suddenly appear out of nowhere, making the surprise effect even greater.” Spectators and passers-by need not worry about a drone falling out of the sky, although the flight area is cordoned off for safety reasons. “If a device runs low on power, it returns to the takeoff and landing platform on its own,” Donsbach and Wilms assure. Charging the drone batteries afterwards takes a lot of time. “We can charge two hundred drones simultaneously, and that takes about three hours. So do the math: six hundred drones take nine hours.” The pair emphasizes once again that safety comes first and that is why one team member is in continuous contact with Maastricht Aachen Airport. “To ensure a good connection, we set up a special 10-meter-high transmission mast every evening for this purpose.” Spoiler The only spoilsport might be the weather, says Donsbach. "Flying isn't possible above wind force 5, because it often blows even harder at an altitude of 90 meters then. And pouring rain can also spoil the party. But a little rain isn't a problem." "In that case, people won't get to see an inferior performance, but a different performance," says Servé Hermans, who expects the drone show to go ahead regardless for at least eighteen of the twenty performances. "I think that if you honestly tell the visitors beforehand that you are dependent on these kinds of factors for an open-air performance, they will understand. After all, if it's pouring rain at André Rieu's, the fireworks after the Vrijthof concerts won't go ahead either." Meanwhile, Hermans' creative mind is already working overtime again. "Indoor drones *do* exist. Would you be allowed to use those for a theater performance as well?" Flying is not possible above wind force 5, because the wind often blows even harder at an altitude of 90 meters. And pouring rain can also spoil the fun. But a little rain isn't a problem.