Luftwaffe bomber flew to within 20 km of New York?

[stepwilk]

While researching an article I'm working on for Aviation History magazine, I came across this stunning--to me--claim in a respected aviation-history book: that the prototype of the Junkers Ju 390 V1 six-engine bomber (the winner of the DLM's Amerika-Bomber contract) during one field test in 1943 crossed the Atlantic to within 20 km of New York, then turned around and flew back to Germany.

Does anybody know if this is true? Sounds phony to me...

[Tyres O'Flaherty]

believe There was much debate at one time when the claims were made, but according to wiki, ''thoroughly debunked''. Junkers Ju 390 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junkers_Ju_390)

[stepwilk]

Thank you, Flat Tires (Tyres?). I expected as much. I couldn't imagine anybody sending a cumbersome, unarmed, one-of-a-kind prototype that close--assuming it had to be Long Island they were approaching--to both Grumman's and Chance Vought's home fields without having any idea what kind of intruder-detection system we were using, since primitive radar was already well underway.

Scramble an F4F, to say nothing of an F4U, and Mr. Junkers would have been dogmeat.

[chiglet]

If the US Radar system was as good as their Anti Submarine system, then the Lufrwaffe could have "looked" at New York, Washington and all places on the East Coast..
This is NOT to decry the US, but to emphasise that they did not think [for a long time, that] the War wasn't on their doorstep.*
*This from the Kreigsmarine [or books that I have read]

[barit1]

Scramble an F4F, to say nothing of an F4U, and Mr. Junkers would have been dogmeat.

Or, a P-47. Republic was right there too. :ok:

[BEagle]

........crossed the Atlantic to within 20 km of New York, then turned around and flew back to Germany.

Sensible fellows!

[Shackman]

They'd obviously heard about the queues to get through Immigration!

[SASless]

I ran across this.....

Fate of Ju-390 V2

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Prototype development

In 1942, the Junkers factory was involved in a competition which Technische Amt (GL/C) invited long-range bomber designs for. The aircraft was required to be able to strike targets in the USA, principally New York, often referred to as the Amerika Bomber.

Participating in that competition were Heinkel's He274, He277, Messerschmitt's Me 264, plus Tank with his Ta 400. Also Projects 0310224.30 and 0310225. Junkers was let a contract to manufacture two prototypes for the Amerika Bomber project.

The invitation to tender was for a long-range, reconnaissance, transport and "Fritz-X" guided-missile carrier aircraft. It had to have a range of 12,000 kilometres. Junkers response was to create the Ju-390 as a six engined version of the Ju-90/Ju-290 family.

The Ju-390 aircraft was developed directly from airframes of the pre-war J-90 civil airliner, but reflecting characteristics of the Ju-290C.

The original Ju-90 aircraft sported just four 660hp BMW132 engines and later models had the BMW139. With development of the Ju-290 military aircraft supercharged BMW801D engines were adopted.

In April 1942 the Ju-90 V6 airframe serial number J4918 was returned to the Junkers factory at Bernberg where it was rebuilt as Ju-390 V1. This was accomplished by insertion of a an extra wingspan and further pair of engines. Four inboard engines housed sets of undercarriage.

Japanese historical sources also note that the Ju-90 V11 airframe was also converted to a Ju-390 aircraft, known as the Ju-390 V2.

The resulting Ju-390 aircraft had a Maximum Take Off Weight (MTOW) of 75,500kg which compares with 73,000kg MTOW for a DC-4, or 76,600kg for the B-29. The Ju-390 had 18% more engine power than the B-29 and 80% more wing area than the B-29. (CORRECTION: DC-4 =73,800lb, not kg. Memory confusing kg and lb. sorry)

References do exist of Ju-90 modification work for the Ju-390 prototype contract at Mersberg.

The first prototype intended for maritime patrol duty flew from Dessau in August 1943. It proved to be longitudinally unstable. This resulted in the insertion of an extra fuselage section in the Ju-390 V2.

The second Ju-390 prototype flew from Bernberg on 20 October 1943. A contract was also let for production of 26 Ju-390 A-1 production aircraft, but that contract was later canceled.

A review of the Ju-390's performance commenced in May 1944 resulted in removal from the airframe of 5 tonnes of equipment and revision of certified take off weight to 80,500kg.

This review included at least one trial flight to South Africa by Ju-390 pilot Hans Pancherz which he wrote about after the war from his home in Barcelona.

The purpose of these re-certification trials was to ensure the aircraft could be assured to carry 8,000kg over a distance of 11,000 kilometres to meet a new requirement later reissued in the winter of 1944 for a jet bomber to reach New York with a miracle weapon.

Ju-390's New York flight

A captured Luftwaffe photographer sergeant based at Mont de Marsan, Unteroffizer Wolf Baumgart, claimed under US interrogation after capture that the Ju-390 had successfully flown to within 12 miles of New York in January 1944. Baumgart's senior officer corroborated this and added the Ju-390 had an endurance of 32 hours. Interrogations were detailed in the US Ninth Air Force A.P.W.I.U. Report 44/1945.

POW interrogations however were not the only basis for this claim. Quite independent reports by British Intelligence were apparently drawn from a number of sources including Enigma intercepts which remained classified for many decades after the war. Two British Intelligence reports from August 1945 entitled ''General Report on Aircraft Engines and Aircraft Equipment'' referred to these flights and author William Green first learned of the Ju-390's New York flight from these reports.

William Green wrote about and published information about the New York flight in his book ''Warplanes of the Second World War," published in 1968.

Mont de Marsan near Bordeaux was home to Fernauflklarungsgruppe Nr.5 (FAGr.5) which was responsible for long range Atlantic reconnaissance by three Ju-290 A-5 aircraft and a sole Ju-390 on strength with that unit at the time.

Evidence of long range Ju-390 flights

Critics of the 6,230 nautical mile New York flight claim that the aircraft could not possibly have flown such a distance, however such critics have never disputed an 11,400 nautical mile round trip to South Africa flown by Hans Pancherz.

It was noted in Pancherz's diary and quoted in the 1969 Daily Telegraph article "Lone Bomber Raid on New York Planned by Hitler." In that article Pancherz noted he flew ''one of the Ju-390 transports'' on a test flight to Cape Town and back in early 1944.

Critics of the New York also object that the unit based at Mont de Marsan (FAGr.5) maintained no unit records of these long range flights.

In his post war memoirs, Albert Speer also refers to a Ju-390 flight to Tokyo "via the polar route." Russian historical sources suggest that this flight took place on 28 February 1945 and delivered from Germany one general Miya Otari about whom there is no surviving historical record.

The flight is also said to have delivered plans for licensed construction of the Ju-390 A-1 within Japan. At the time Japan was itself working on a project to build an atomic weapon for use against USA.

Evidence for a second Ju-390

The case for existence of a second Ju-390, or rather the Ju-390 V2 comes from various sources. Most often cited is the logbook entries of Oberleutnant Joachim Eisermann, dated 9 February 1945 at Reichlin air base.

One handling flight lasted 50 minutes and composed of circuits around Reichlin. The second 20 minute flight was to ferry Ju-390 V2 to Lärz. In March 1945 following disbandment of their unit members of FAGr.5 visited both Reichlin and Lärz and found no sign of the other Ju-390 aircraft at either air base.

Two famous photographs of the Ju-390 on the ground were taken at Prague in February 1945.

The Ju-390 V1 is known to have been flown to Dessau in November 1944 and stripped of propellers. It lay there derelict until destroyed by fire following an air raid in January 1945.

Evidence supporting only one Ju-390

Post war Ju-390 project pilot Haupt Hans Pancherz claimed only one Ju-390 was ever flown. At a hearing before British authorities on 26 September 1945 Professor Heinrich Hertel, chief designer and technical director of Junkers Aircraft & Motor Works also asserted the Ju-390 V2 had never been built.

If one accepts that only one Ju-390 existed then one has to explain flights by Ju-390 aircraft after November 1944.

Association with Nazi Bell evacuation 1945

Post war SS Lt Gen Dr. Hans Kammler's deputy in charge of the Skoda works, Dr. Wilhelm Voss was interviewed by British journalist Tom Agoston.

Voss claimed that the Ju-390 was used to evacuate a centrifuge which ionised mercury called the Nazi Bell, from Silesia to Bodo Norway.

Bodo at the time was home to a unit of Stuka dive bombers and some Ju-88 aircraft. It's runway was built on a flat marshy peninsula with wooden planking. The runway there was relatively short, but given the Ju-390's eight main wheel undercarriage and considerable wing area, not an impossible airstrip for the Ju-390.

An SS report held at the Berlin Document Centre states that this second Ju-390 prototype was at Schweidnitz near Breslau in April 1945 for the evacuation of Kammler's Bell project.

The aircraft is also mentioned flying from Prague to Opole airfield near Ludwigsdorf and departure to Bodo with the so called Bell device accompanied by Herbert Jensen, Hermen Oberth and Elizabeth Adler.

Information about the Nazi bell was not in the public arena until Polish wartime records were declassified in 1998.

A wartime service course sheet (available at Berlin Document Centre) for SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer Rudolf Schuster attached to SS-WVHA Amt-V zbV refers to Ju-390 operations in 1945.

This officer stated that in the second half of April 1945 a Junkers Ju 390 attached to KG 200 was at Schweidnitz (an airfield SW of Breslau) where it loaded materials from a secret project coded "Cronos/Laternentraeger."

This report says the aircraft was painted pale blue and had Swedish AF markings. It was guarded by SS and concealed beneath tarpaulin. It is known to have taken off for Bodo in Norway, but nothing further is known of its activity.

The Nazi bell is also mentioned in Argentine wartime intelligence reports. These reports refer to "a multi-engined German transport aircraft" at Gualeguay, Entre Rios in May 1945.

This document describes the laboratory equipment known as "the Bell" aboard the aircraft, and its purpose. The information about the Bell did not become public knowledge until 1998, when the Polish archives released certain information about the Bell experiments which matches precisely the Argentine description of that device.

Unfortunately the Nazi Bell project has attracted support from people who wish to link it with bizarre claims of UFO sightings and this has detracted from objective treatment of the fundemental underlying truth about the Bell's existence.

In the Polish material declassified in 1998 there is reference to a Polish diplomat who witnessed a Ju-390 being dismantled at a German ranch in Paysandu Province Uruguay. Argentine wartime reports also refer to this aircraft being dismantled. The aircraft concerned appears to be the Ju-390 V2.

An Argentine document from the Economics archive details regular flights carrying cargo from Germany. It states that during the period 1943-1944 an air shuttle operated between Madrid and El Palomar military aerodrome, Buenos Aires, and that FW 200 aircraft were used.

Whilst the Ju-390 V1 ended it's days at Dessau at the hands of an air raid, there are considerable sightings of an active Ju-390 after Ju-390 V1's destruction and this aircraft appears to have ended it's days in Uruguay in May 1945.

[dakkg651]

Stepwilk.

Just to clear up your confusion.

Tyres, as positioned on each corner of an automobile, is the correct spelling on this side of the Atlantic.

Tires, to us Brits, means to run out of energy.

Hope that helps old boy.

[millerscourt]

dakkg651

you should perhaps have told him that we call automobiles cars this side of the Atlantic so as to further his education:D

[dakkg651]

Millerscourt.

Ah Shucks.

You'll get me on to things like planes being carpentry tools if you're not careful.......and why the P51 was a dud until Hooker put a decent British engine in it............and the jet engine, the angled carrier deck, the steam catapult, the mirror landing system, the all flying tailplane to get through the sound barrier, RDF (radar to our cousins) and the fact that WWII started on the 3rd Sep 1939 and not 7th Dec 1941.

But I'll refrain this time.

[pigboat]

You'll get me on to things like planes being carpentry tools if you're not careful.......

And why air becomes aero east of 10W.

[dakkg651]

That's because we Brits respect the fact that the Wright Brothers christened their invention an 'aeroplane' not an 'airplane'.

[barit1]

...and why the P51 was a dud until Hooker put a decent British engine in it...

And why the P-51 might have never happened until "Dutch" Kindleberger talked the British Purchasing Commission out of buying more P-40's.

[SASless]

Shall we dare mention only 4/5ths of Fighter Command were British during the BoB.

Or....one of your fighter squadrons was commanded by an American.

Or...there is a special cemetery for Americans killed wearing Crab Blue.

Or...we were escorting convoys well prior to December 7th.....and had destroyers sunk by U-Boats while doing it.

The other question is why we have used and are still using all those carrier things and the Brits are not?

Ya'll get hung up on the Yanks being over paid, over sexed, and over here and ignore the truth which is the Brits were under paid, under sexed, and under Eisenhower.:E

[dakkg651]

barit

You should have mentioned that the original Merlin, the PV12, was an enlarged version of the Kestrel which in itself was derived from an American Curtiss V12 but I'm glad you didn't.

Didn't the last versions of the P40 have a Packard Merlin? How much did that improve the performance over the Alison marks? Enough to make interceptions of Ju390s just off the US coast a tad easier I wager.

[stepwilk]

Thanks for the automotive education. Having been the Editor of a magazine called Car and Driver, which perhaps should have been Motorcar and Dryver, I needed that.

Sorry I started the Third Anglo-American War.

[dakkg651]

SASless

Of course you're right.

We couldn't have done it without a lot of help especially from your direction. That is why I am in the process of restoring an example of one of the best aeroplanes ever produced by the US as a memorial to the crews who flew them and the gliders they towed.

The answer to your question about why we don't have proper carriers is easy.

It's because of the total unwillingness of successive goverments to learn from history.

When Ark was paid off in 78, the RAF assured the incumbent bunch of idiots that they could provide air cover to the Navy anywhere on the globe. Of course they had to redesign the World in order to achieve this. I believe Australia had to be moved about a thousand miles for example.

Thank goodness we still had Hermes (just) in 82.

Now the present unelected non-English muppet wants to spend millions on big brother identity cards for us poor long suffering souls. This money will probably end up coming from the cancellation of our two promised carriers. He wont do this, however, until all the Harriers have been sent to join the Jaguars on the scrapheap. Then he can cancel JSF as well.

Thank your lucky stars that you live in the land of the free.

All we've got left is our memories and our banter.

Bl**dy Hell I really feel depressed now. Must stiffen the old upper lip what?

[Mr Grimsdale]

Voss claimed that the Ju-390 was used to evacuate a centrifuge which ionised mercury called the Nazi Bell, from Silesia to Bodo Norway.

I had heard about this "Nazi bell" before but only in the context of the tinfoil hat fraternity.

Does anyone know what it was supposed to achieve?

[millerscourt]

I can see why they say our American cousins do not understand our humour ( woops sorry humor to them!)

[treadigraph]

Didn't the last versions of the P40 have a Packard Merlin?
Not sure about a Packard Merlin, but the P-40F was certainly Merlin powered, and Judy Pay has just flown her magnificent P-40F restoration down in Oz a week or so back. The Fighter Collection also has one well on its way to flying again, currently at the same location I think.

[dakkg651]

Treadigraph

Thanks for that info.

Is Judy currently attached do you know?

[treadigraph]

No idea mate, but if she isn't then there's a queue!

She also has a Mustang.

[dakkg651]

Blast.

In that case perhaps I'll have another go at Caroline Grace!

[barit1]

You should have mentioned that the original Merlin, the PV12, was an enlarged version of the Kestrel which in itself was derived from an American Curtiss V12 but I'm glad you didn't.

I was not aware of that lineage.

But I may be the only chap in Pprune who has applied a spanner to the Curtiss V-1570 (http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Lab/4515/p6e.htm) V-12 - I was a student at Purdue when the USAF delivered the bones of a Curtiss P-6E (http://www.pprune.org/4910185-post88.html) as a student project for the A&P school. All we had of the lower RH wing was a few scraps of wood and the steel brackets. We built that wing panel from scratch, as a mate to the LH lower.

The engine was in good condition, and we were about to order gaskets, seals etc. for it -- when the lower longerons were found to be too far gone. The USAF didn't want to spend the time & money to complete an airworthy restoration, so the engine was assembled "dry" for display.

[pigboat]

That's because we Brits respect the fact that the Wright Brothers christened their invention an 'aeroplane' not an 'airplane'.

It's fortunate for the Brits that Langley went into the drink, then. :p

[chevvron]

I am informed the Americans didn't have a decent east coast detection system until after the V- bomber raids in the late '50s.

[teeteringhead]

ISTR reading a novel relatively recently about a fictional WW2 German raid on ConUS to half-inch some bits of the Manhattan project...

..... their aircraft used AAR to cross the pond.

And another brain-cell has just fired off saying it was written by a US politician ? I've scanned the library shelves of Teetering Towers and can't find it, so it might all be imagination - although I can remember some more curious detail....

...... and following the thread drift on aircraft engine lineage, is it true that RR scaled up Merlin/Gryphon superchargers to make the centrifugal compressor stages of their early jet engines?

[ICT_SLB]

TH,
Think the novel you're thinking about is "1945" by Newt Gingrich & William Forstchen. It postulates a raid on Oakridge, TN very similar in concept to the RAF raid on Peenemunde - if you can't stop the weapon, remove the builders.

[teeteringhead]

Yes that's the one - Newt Gingrich is not a name I would have thought I'd forgotten - Leader of the Senate or something...

.... the book had Otto Skorzeny leading the raid, and amongst the defenders IIRC was one Sgt York (WW1 MoH winner) who was in the local Home Guard or similar ...... All I need to do now is find a reference for the compressor design story .....

[pigboat]

There was another book that was published about the time the Kennedy administration decided the manned bomber was obsolete and ICBM's were the way to go. The plot involved a raid on three American cities, New York, Chicago and Washington by three flights of three Vulcan bombers. The idea was they would take pictures of all three cities and return, as opposed to the one-way missile. I read the book in 1966 and I can't for the life of me remember the title, but I do remember it being an excellent yarn.

[Windy Militant]

Its called the Penetrators It was written by Hank Searls originally published in 1965 under the pseudonym of Anthony Gray. A cracking read :ok:




ISBN-10: 0722140746
ISBN-13: 978-0722140741

[pigboat]

Thank you WM. :ok:
I shall look for that on eBay or Amazon. On second thought, I know a dealer in used books...

[SASless]

As I grew up....my sister was in the Volunteer Observer Corps....where I got my first real interest in airplanes looking at all the silouette books during their training sessions. Right outside of town the Air Force had a Radar Station that was part of the early radar defense system that included Texas Towers and radar sites all along our borders.

The Air Force also had portable field sites that could be deployed as needed.

All this was during the "Duck and Cover" era....where we practiced Air Raid measures in schools across the country on a weekly basis.

The good thing about the radar station was it allowed for me , as a young squaddie, to drink at age 18 while on home on leave, rather than having to wait for my 21st birthday to buy spirits. Thus I reckon all those millions of dollars maintaining the site were not completely wasted.

[ChristiaanJ]

Thanks, WM.
Just ordered it.

[chiglet]

Its called the Penetrators It was written by Hank Searls originally published in 1965 under the pseudonym of Anthony Gray. A cracking read http://static.pprune.org/images/smilies/thumbs.gif

I had a fairly old copy, bought whilst still in the RAF in 1967.My son's dog ate it. I shall now replace it :ok: Thanks:D