Losses of LW for the 16 oct 1944

[Many Souffan]

Hello, bonjour.

I would like to know if somenone can help me or maybe, where I can find the losses of the LW in the east for the 16 october 1944.

By advance Thank you.

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Many, just wondering if you're interested in the 29 victories of Normandie-Niemen this day.

The Luftwaffe units involved in the day air battle were AFAIK JG 51, JG 52 and JG 54 and SG units (including SG 4).

I have few info on their real losses.

JG 52 lost only one pilot killed this day, Uffz Gunter Kunert.

JG 54 loss list has only one Eastern Front loss this day, Ofhr. Georg-Heinrich Koch of 6./JG 54 KIA in Luftkampf aboard Fw190A-8 WNr 380160 in Pl.Qu. 17487.

[Jean-Yves Lorant]

Good feeling, Laurent...Capitaine Roland de La Poype's biographer tries currently to find german losses corresponding to french claims on 16 october 1944. Having flown over 100 sorties, the pilots of Régiment de Chasse 3 "Normandie-Niemen" claimed 16 Fw 190, 8 Bf 109 and 5 Ju 87 as destroyed, two other Fw 190 as probably destroyed and two more Bf 109 damaged in the sector "Vilkavitchki-Chtaloupienen" that day! Big problems are in prospect...

A typical case of overclaiming ?

All the best

Jean-Yves Lorant

[Andreas Brekken]

Hi.

I am not entering an overclaimimg discussion, but have some numbers:

Aircraft missing/lost/damaged due to enemy action 16th October 1944:

Jagdgeschwader 51
Stab - 0/1/1
I. - 0/0/1
II. - 0/0/0
III. - 1/2/2

Jagdgeschwader 52
Stab - 0/0/0
I. - 0/0/0
II. - 0/0/0
III. - 1/0/0

Jagdgeschwader 54
Stab - 0/0/0
I. - 0/0/0
II. - 1/0/0
III. - 0/0/0

Schlachgeschwader 4
Stab - 0/0/0
I. - 0/2/0
II. - 0/0/1

For these units a total of

3 aircraft missing
5 aircraft damaged over 50% (lost)
5 aircraft damaged below 50% (damaged)

Regards,
Andreas

[Laurent Rizzotti]

Hi, Andreas,

This day the French pilots of Normandie-Niemen claimed 5 Ju 87. I have in my files that Ju 87 were lost during the month of October 1944 by the following units (not counting NSGr units):
I./SG1 (2 to enemy action)
10./SG1 (3 to enemy action)
10./SG3 (1 to enemy action)
all of which were operating over East Prussia
(and also by III./SG2 (1 to enemy action) and 10./SG2 (2 to enemy action), but both over Hungary, so outside of our study field here).

Can you please check the losses of SG 1 and SG 3 for this day, especially Ju 87s ? Thanks in advance

As for your list of losses, a French source describes a morning battle between JG 52 and Normandie-Niemen, with JG 52 boucing Soviet bombers with some success and then losing 5 Bf 109s. Oblt Rudolf Trenkel of 2./JG 52 and his wingman, Fähnrich Windish, were both shot down (first force-landed and then his Bf109 was strafed and destroyed, second bailed out). Both were apparently unhurt so won't be in surviving official loss lists.

Can anybody here confirm that Trenkel was shot down this day ?

Also, I any of the Russian contributors of this forum is reading this, it would be interesting to know how many victories were scored by Soviet units in the same area. From my only source ("Stalin's Falcons"), Soviet pilots scored also a number of victories this day.

The Soviet communique of 18 Oct 1944, midnight, reported a total of 73 enemy aircraft destroyed by Soviet forces aircraft (very probably including Normandie-Niemen) and AA fire on all fronts on the 16th. Ok it is not the best available source but at least gave an idea of what the number of claims was.

As for overclaiming, I'm quite sure the French pilots didn't shot down 29 AC this day... Twenty will be normal overclaiming, but the true number may well be less than that, given the number of units in the air this day.

[Many Souffan]

Thank you Laurent, Jean-Yves and Andreas for your answers

[Nikita Egorov]

Originally Posted by Laurent Rizzotti

Also, I any of the Russian contributors of this forum is reading this, it would be interesting to know how many victories were scored by Soviet units in the same area. From my only source ("Stalin's Falcons"), Soviet pilots scored also a number of victories this day.
.

In the same area 16 october 1944:

18 GIAP - 18 Fw-190
900 IAP - 3 Fw-190

Both regiments belonged to 303 IAD.

[HGabor]

Hi Laurent,

"JG 52 lost only one pilot killed this day, Uffz Gunter Kunert."

Do you have any information on his plane and the area of his loss? Maybe a dogfight? Thanks,

Gabor

[Ota Jirovec]

Hello HGabor,

Uffz. Günther Kunert, member of 9./JG 52, was killed when bailing out after aerial combat from Bf 109G-6 WNr. 442037, yellow 4. The source for this is Jagdgeschwader JG 52, Vol. IV, p. 129, by Niko Fast who does not provide detail about the location of Kunert´s loss. However, according to www.volksbund.de Kunert (born on 4 February 1922 in Pilzen) was lost over Trakehnen airfield, i.e. in Eastern Prussia.

Hope this helps a little,

Ota

[Nokose]

Most of what's in this thread I found the date to be on the 17th. Which is in the thread I had for the Normandie-Nieman Groupe for the 17Oct44. Still don't know the losses for the SG units but from the information here it appears that there was overclaiming by the Normandie and VVS units unless there was damaged aircraft returning to base.