Spike and Suzy and Suzy happen in real countries all over the world, with Belgium (their home country) as main focus for many stories. While in the early stories large distances were usually traveled using the fictitious "Gyronef", an experimental helicopter devised by professor Barabas, starting from the 1960s all air travel is provided by the Dutch national airline KLM, making it an early and prominent example of product placement in European comics. Vandersteen chose KLM over the Belgian national airline SABENA because of his friendship with Ron Winderink, PR manager at KLM. Willy Vandersteen created "Suske en Wiske", beginning publication in "De
Sabena planes were part of a record-order of 34 Airbus A320 family aircraft, imposed on Sabena when under Swissair management. After an airline recession and the effects on the airline industry of the September 11 attacks in 2001, all airlines that flew across the Atlantic suffered. Swissair had pledged to invest millions in Sabena but failed to do so, partly because the airline had financial problems itself, having filed for bankruptcy protection one month prior. The company filed for legal protection against its creditors on 3 October, and went into liquidation on 6 November 2001. Fred Chaffart, Chairman of the Board