Buvens’ Story – Transport XX • Miracles Docs #9 • 20260604 🇳🇱🇬🇧 🇧🇪🇫🇷

Buvens’ Story – Transport XX • Miracles Docs #9 • 20260604 🇳🇱🇧🇪 Dutch-Flemish (original) • Subtitles: 🇬🇧 English Open Captions & 🇫🇷 🇧🇪 🇳🇱 French, Dutch, Flemish Closed Captions (CC)

SYNOPSIS

Dutch 🇳🇱 — Buvens’ Story Transport XX — Miracles Docs Episode #9 — Documentaire over het verhaal van treinbestuurder Buvens, die in de nacht van 19 april 1943 Transport XX tot stilstand brengt voor een rood licht ‚ op het spoor tussen Boortmeerbeek, Haacht en Hambos. Het verhaal wordt verteld door zijn dochter Marie-José Buvens en getoond in het verslag dat de Belgische Nationale Maatschappij der Spoorwegen (NMBS/SNCB) maakte april 1943, enkele dagen na die aanval op Transport XX naar Auschwitz.
🎬 Korte film van Michel van der Burg & Marc Michiels • Miracles•Media — Nederlandstalig gesproken met Engelse en Franse ondertiteling. Première op 4 juni 2026 bij Miracles•Media.

English 🇬🇧 — Buvens’ Story Transport XX — Miracles Docs Episode #9 — Documentary about the story of train driver Buvens, who on the night of 19 April 1943 brings Transport XX to a halt at a red light on the track between Boortmeerbeek, Haacht and Hambos. The story is told by his daughter Marie-José Buvens and shown in the report that the Belgian National Railway Company (NMBS/SNCB) produced in April 1943, a few days after that attack on Transport XX bound for Auschwitz.
🎬 Short film by Michel van der Burg & Marc Michiels • Miracles•Media — Spoken in Dutch with English and French subtitles. Premiere on 4 June 2026 at Miracles•Media.

Français 🇫🇷 — Buvens’ Story Transport XX — Miracles Docs Épisode #9 — Documentaire sur l’histoire du machiniste de train Buvens, qui dans la nuit du 19 avril 1943 immobilise le Transport XX à un feu rouge sur la voie entre Boortmeerbeek, Haacht et Hambos. L’histoire est racontée par sa fille Marie-José Buvens et illustrée par le rapport que la Société Nationale des Chemins de fer Belges (SNCB/NMBS) a établi en avril 1943, quelques jours après cette attaque contre le Transport XX à destination d’Auschwitz.
🎬 Court métrage de Michel van der Burg & Marc Michiels • Miracles•Media — Parlé en néerlandais avec sous-titres en anglais et en français. Première le 4 juin 2026 chez Miracles•Media.

Documentary

Daughter Marie-José Buvens recounts her father August Buvens’ (1898–1982) account as train driver on Transport XX (D.A.801) — the night of April 19, 1943, when the train stopped at a red light on the track near the towns of Boortmeerbeek, Haacht, and the hamlet of Hambos. Recorded on video tape June 12, 2001 in Kessel-Lo, Belgium, by Marc Michiels. A transcript from this testimony was published online from 2003 at Marc Michiels’ site Holocaust Boortmeerbeek – XXth Convoy (1).

This short documentary film by Michel van der Burg, co-produced with Marc Michiels (†2021), combines that June 2001 testimony of Marie-José Buvens (1,2) with a recently published ‘Special Accident Report’ of the Belgian National Railway Company NMBS/SNCB (‘Bijzonder Ongevalsverslag’) made April 1943 (3), three days after what became known as the attack on the 20th Convoy to Auschwitz — ‘Transport XX’.

Notes

1) August Buvens, engine driver XXth convoy. Marc Michiels. In : Holocaust Boortmeerbeek – XXth Convoy (website). Retrieved from July 18, 2003 snapshot of the website in Marc Michiels Collection (1MEMO_20260604_3) • Miracles•Media • Text from transcript testimony (2) of August Buvens daughter , Mrs Marie-José Buvens on June 12, 2001 in Kessel-Lo, Belgium .

Holocaust Boortmeerbeek – XXth Convoy • Edition 2003 Website Marc Michiels • August Buvens, engine driver XXth convoy • Retrieved from July 18, 2003 snapshot of the website • Marc Michiels Collection • Miracles•Media • 1MEMO_20260604_3 • Screen capture (note : at french page credit address redacted).

A last revision of Marc Michiels’ site (2016) was republished at transportxxboortmeerbeek.be (posthumous) including a copy of this 2003 portrait page of Buvens (Retrieved June 4, 2026) URL https://transportxxboortmeerbeek.be/eng/starten.htm

2) Excerpt 7 minutes from a 44 min interview by Marc Michiels of Marie-José Buvens (from Kessel-Lo; daughter August Buvens), June 12, 2001 , Kessel-Lo (Video Tape) . Source : Digitized video tape ‘20010612 Getuigenis Marie J Buvens’ (DVD July 26, 2013) Michel van der Burg • Marc Michiels Collection • Miracles•Media

3) Belgian National Railway Company NMBS/SNCB ‘Special Accident Report’ 23 April 1943. Source : Nico Wouters , CegeSoma Report , Senate / State Archives Belgium) • Bijzonder Ongevalsverslag nr. 6 1943, Dossier 308 (A1052/43) 27 April 1943, Dossiers 727-2729 Sabotages 1943, Arch. NMBS/SNCB.NMBS Archive . URL https://www.senate.be/home/sections/geschiedenis_en_erfgoed/NMBS-SNCB/CegeSoma-rapport-def.pdf

Additional

Map : Carte Officielle Des Chemins De Fer Belges (Octobre 1927) Societé Nationale des Chemins de fer Belges. Institut Cartographique Militaire 1927. Scale 1:400.000

Reglement Omtrent de Handseinen. Beheer van Staatsspoorwegen. Brussel, 1922.

DRB Class 50 steam locomotive and freight train video and sound (2011). Michel van der Burg • Miracles•Media

Social Edition Film dd 20260604
This ‘social’ edition of the video dd 20260604 has burned in English captions facilitating posting at social media.

Comments & corrections — like for French, Flemish subtitles — welcome : send me a message please via contact form at https://miracles.media/about/ Thanks , Michel van der Burg

Citation info :
🎬 Buvens’ Story – Transport XX • Miracles Docs #9 • Miracles•Media • 1MEMO_20260604_1 • ISAN 0000-0007-329C-0009-A-0000-0001-5 • Short film (9 min) by Michel van der Burg & Marc Michiels • © 2026 Miracles•Media • Source miracles.media/2026/06/04/

Balinese Monkey • Portrait #1 • @1MEMO 20251115

Close encounter – I was attacked later that day , when getting too close while taking such a portrait photo, but escaped falling backwards.
Balinese long-tailed macaque, semi-wild in the Sacred Monkey Forest Sanctuary in Ubud , Bali, Indonesia, Sep. 2000.

#monkey #Bali #macaque #portrait #attack #escape #photography #encounter

Citation info : Balinese Monkey • Portrait #1 • Michel van der Burg • Miracles•Media • @1MEMO 20251115 • TakeNode 1dd4c86e-43fb-4893-a52b-8f1395202e07

Youtube Creator Top 25 Award • Transport XX • @1MEMO 20251021

#24 Most Viewed Today on YouTube • TRANSPORT XX – installation Brussels

My ‘Channel 012’ ranked the #24 Most Viewed Today YouTube channel in the Netherlands on the first day after uploading the captivating video Transport XX . The next day again it reached #23 Most Viewed Today.

Channel012 ranking was #68 in Most Viewed (This Week) , a week after uploading Transport XX.

Channel012 is renamed Michel van der Burg | Miracles • Media Both usernames and links work :
@channel012
@michelvanderburg
https://www.youtube.com/channel012
https://www.youtube.com/michelvanderburg

Pioneer

Google purchased YouTube late 2006. I started late 2007, with a first upload. Between ~ 2007-2011 channel pages were equipped with view counters, bulletin boards, and were awarded badges for various rank-based achievements, such as ” “#68 – Most Viewed (This Week)”. The term “gurus” on YouTube referred to a specific category of content creators who focused on education. This category helped establish YouTube as a platform for influencers. You could change your account type to eg. Director, Comedian, Musician.

Notes

TRANSPORT XX – installation Brussels

The film was uploaded close to midnight April 19th, 2009, registered by YouTube as April 20th, 2009.
This short documentary is a video impression (2009) of the confrontation of passers-by with the TRANSPORT XX installation in Brussels, that presented photographic portraits of 1,200 of the 1,631 Jewish prisoners deported with the 20th train convoy to Auschwitz , the night of April 19th in 1943. Half an hour after the departure of this transport XX three young Belgians from Brussels, Youra Livschitz, Jean Franklemon and Robert Maistriau stopped the train between Boortmeerbeek and Haacht, opened one of the cars and liberated 17 prisoners. Later before the train reaches the German border over 200 other prisoners decide to attempt to escape and also jump out of the cars. This was the only documented attack on a death train during the Holocaust.

A 1minute edition of Transport XX premiered in the Paradiso theater in Amsterdam Nov. 28, 2010 – in The One Minutes – Where history starts …film festival . Here the registration :
Transport XX in Paradiso | The One Minutes Collection | 20200607 | URL https://youtu.be/KuyQzLXQo3g

A behind the scenes film of the making of this film was published last year : Flow | Miracles Moment #1 | 20240513 | URL https://youtu.be/iwQQLvGtUm0

The original post at imichel.com URL https://www.imichel.com/2009/04/transport-xx-installation-brussels.html Repost at michelvanderburg.com :
TRANSPORT XX — installation Brussels | imichel•com | 20090419 | URL https://michelvanderburg.com/2009/04/19/transport-xx-installation-brussels-imichelcom-20090419/

#YouTube #creator #award #BTS #making #top #guru #badge #channel012 #street #art #TransportXX #views #holocaust #channel #remembrance #education #KazerneDossin #Brussels #war

Citation info : Youtube Creator Top 25 Award • Transport XX • Michel van der Burg • Miracles•Media • 20251021 • TakeNode 39bdf260-095a-4749-acd7-e18adc9108c5 / 9f425f47-55b0-4637-9c1c-019879110895

TikTok @MiraclesMedia 20250503

TikTok – Says the seagull attacking – pecking at the shiny camera lens of my drone flying along the Normandy chalk cliffs in France.

@miraclesmedia
TikTok @miraclesmedia 20250503 • TikTok – Says the seagull attacking – pecking at the shiny camera lens of my drone flying along the Normandy chalk cliffs in France. #tik_tok #blooper #drone #attack #bird #crash
♬ original sound – miraclesmedia – miraclesmedia

#tik_tok #blooper #drone #attack #bird #crash

Citation info : TikTok @MiraclesMedia 20250503 • TakeNode 99f73500-7348-45db-97c6-339e40c27bf2

Transport XX Boortmeerbeek 2025 • @1MEMO 20250423

“Zog nit keyn mol” – Never Say … the Yiddish Partisan Song written in 1943 by Hirsh Glick.

Special, limited, Transport XX commemoration this year in Boortmeerbeek, Belgium on 21th April 2025.

Notes

Photo, video, thanks to Michel Baert and Nick Doms, Municipal council Boortmeerbeek.

Watch also the entire Boormeerbeek Crescendo choir singing “Zog nit keyn mol” here
https://youtu.be/FmXmhzzuUc4

Citation info : Transport XX Boortmeerbeek 2025 • Miracles•Media | 20250423

Resistance | Miracles Moment #2 | 20240515

Faces of the attackers and escapees of Transport XX reflecting in the windows of this train leaving Boortmeerbeek station direction Mechelen, during the commemoration May 15, 2011 of Transport XX to Auschwitz.

The night of April 19, 1943, the 20th convoy left the transit camp Kazerne Dossin in Mechelen, with 1631 jewish deportees in circa 33 cattle cars heading for Auschwitz.

After passing the Boortmeerbeek train station, the three young Brussels’ heroes Youra Livschitz, Robert Maistriau, and Jean Franklemon, attacked this 20th convoy, opening one of the cars, and liberating 17 people.

A total of 238 deportees managed to escape from this death train before the Belgian border, by opening the cattle cars from the inside, with the help of some 20 jewish resistance fighters among the deportees, and also a second hold-up shortly after midnight at Korbeek-Lo.

The total number of 238 escapees (data update April 2024) , includes (i) the 17 people liberated during the attack in Boortmeerbeek, (ii) the escape of the 6-year-old boy Aron Luksenberg (a recent finding by Jo Peeters) , and (iii) the escape of Viviane , who escaped in the womb of her three-months pregnant mother Isabella Weinreb-Castegnier, and was born 6 months later in Brussels (Miracles.Media).

Just over half of the number of escapees – a total of 122 – managed to escape permanently — 26 escapees were shot dead when they jumped, and 90 escapees were recaptured and redeported…

Notes

Reflection shows the Transport XX – installation Boortmeerbeek, of four large canvases of three meters high and five meters wide placed ‘wagon-like’ next to each other, parallel to the Mechelen-Leuven railway line, with portraits of deported Jews who managed to escape from the XXth transport on Belgian territory. The first of the four large canvases also features the three young men who stopped the train, Youra (Georges) Livschitz, Jean Franklemon and Robert Maistriau.

The Transport XX – installation Boortmeerbeek was created for the 2007 Boortmeerbeek commemoration of Transport XX, with the theme: ‘Give Them a face’, and later commemoration events, thanks to Marc Michiels (commemoration coordinator) in collaboration with Marjan Verplancke and co-workers of the project “Give Them a Face” of Kazerne Dossin / Jewish Museum of Deportation and Resistance in Mechelen (Belgium) . Portraits of escapees are mostly from the State Archives, Brussels, digitized by Kazerne Dossin. Boortmeerbeek.

Transport XX Boortmeerbeek – Marc Michiels | 20240309

Transport XX Boortmeerbeek – Marc Michiels https://transportxxboortmeerbeek.be

Marc Michiels – expert author on the history of Transport XX and coordinator for many years of the annual Transport XX commemorations in Boortmeerbeek, Belgium – unfortunately passed away April 2021 . Some months later his web site ‘holocaust’ (at telenet.be) dedicated to Transport XX was taken offline.
Now — when searching for info on Robert Korten – Marc’s predecessor as the first coordinator and founder of the XXth convoy-commemorations – I was happy to to find Marc’s website is back online, now at the appropriate new domain : transportxxboortmeerbeek.be

Citation info : Transport XX Boortmeerbeek – Marc Michiels | 20240309 | Miracles•Media | TakeNode fd808fa3-09f2-4c0d-b9c8-f711a47b05ba | URL 1-memo.com/2024/03/09