Smoke machines that did not work well and safety glass that broke. The security of the Dacia exhibition in the Drents Museum did not work well at the theft of the golden helmet of Cotofenesti and the three gold bracelets. This is what Erest Oberländer-târnoveanu, former director of the National Historical Museum in Bucharest and guest curator of the Dacia-Rijk van Goud and Silver exhibition concludes.
The smoke protection of the Drents Museum in Assen failed. “The exhibition space should have been filled with a milky smoke within a few seconds of the explosion, where you see nothing more,” says Oberländer-Târnoveanu. “Not even your own hands. In Assen the smoke development started too slowly. Why didn’t the mechanism work well?”
Oberländer-târnoveanu was director of the National Historical Museum in Bucharest, of which the Drents Museum lends the pieces. He was dismissed by the Minister of Culture in the aftermath of the art. Two months after the Goudoof he is still full of questions. “What I don’t understand is: how could the showcases break so quickly? That should not be possible.”
Earlier, the Romanian museum also criticized the fact that there was no guard at the Drents Museum at night.
In the night from Friday January 24 to Saturday January 25, criminals managed to open a door of the Drents Museum with explosives. Within minutes they managed to steal the most important treasures. The total value thereof is estimated at 6 million.
A week after the robbery, three suspects were arrested in Heerhugowaard, later also a fourth. Three of them are still stuck. A woman has been released, but still a suspect. A fifth suspect is still free.