Bernhard Jope KG 40

[Chris Goss]

Sorry but nothing that would link either to the ship of the FW 200 that I can find at this time

[Brian Bines]

Just a thought if Jope's aircraft was a C-2, I believe only eight were built ,and 022 F8+AK and 024 F8+OK were lost earlier in October while 023 was 30% damaged at the end of Sept. did any of 014 to 018 have an individual aircraft letter of 'S'. I wonder if Sirius the brightest star in the sky came from the aircraft code and are records availble with info. to confirm the posibility or not,

Regards

Brian Bines

[schnellmeyer]

If the C-2 Condors were produced from Werks Nrs. 0014 to 0024 , then there would have been eleven units produced . I also believe that 0015 may have been lost in August 1940 over Ireland . The search goes on !

[Tony Kearns]

Evening all,
I have W.Nrs. 0019,0020 and 0021 all listed as Type D-2 in my DB is this incorrect ?
Regards
Tony K

[schnellmeyer]

Yes ,you could be right Tony . In Heinz Nowarra's book on the FW200 he lists , 0019 , 0020 and 0021 as D-2's . So if this is correct then only eight C-2 were produced indeed .

[Brian Bines]

If you have a copy of ' The Luftwaffe in the BoB' by Armand van Ishoven see page 107 which appears to show part of the last two letters of the fuslage code of Jope's aircraft (photos credited to Sdf. Brandt). The article also gives Jope's crew as 2Ff Burkhardt, BM Uffz,. Dorshel, Bf Uffz Iwang, 2Bf Ogef Mix, Met. Dr Habisch , I wonder if a logbook for any of these exists. Signal magazine for Nov. 40 covers the story but no photos if I remember, maybe its possible that more of Brand's photos are in another edition.

[schnellmeyer]

Hi Brian , I do not have a copy of the book you mentioned but could you please tell me what the last two letters appear to be in the photo ?
I was also very interested to see that the Meteorologist was listed as Dr. Habisch . On April 18 , 1941 a FW 200 C-3 "F8+GL" wrk nr.0053 crash landed off the coast off Cork , Ireland and all the crew survived . There was a Met guy on this plane who's name was Dr.Walter Habisch , I wonder is this the same guy who flew with Jope's crew ???

[Brian Bines]

Hi, I was a bit reluctant to guess at the letters as there is poor resolution on the photos, I had hoped my post would have found someone with better and possibly more of this set of photos. One photo appears to show part of an 'E' or 'F' following the fuslage cross, a second photo shows part of the next letter as a vertical line which I would assume to be part of a 'K' for the 2nd. Staffel. I would not place too much on this unless some other confirmation can be produced, as regards Habisch the Wekusta book only mention his capture on 18th April 1941 so I assume its the same man.
Sorry not to be more positive on the aircraft letters perhaps the post will lead to more info. on this search,

Regards

Brian Bines

[schnellmeyer]

Thanks for all your help Brian . Would be great to find out more information about Dr. Habisch as he seems to be a early met guy with KG40 .

[Larry Hickey]

Hello all,

I have a copy of the van Ishoven book that Brian referred to. I see what he means about the images being unclear. The code could be +?H or?K, but the first letter looks like it may have been repainted and isn't clear from the angle seen. It doesn't look like an "S," and that is not an a/c letter that seems typical for an Fw200 a/c letter in 1940, based upon a review of the 67 images in the EoE DB. I suspect that these photos are from the BA, so we are likely to have to go to that source to find photos of the PK images. Obviously a whole film strip of images exists, and one of the unpublished out-takes may show what we need.

Regards,

Larry Hickey
EoE Project Coordinator