Me 410 SI+KW - night fighter?

[Marcel Hogenhuis]

Hello Christian,

Good observation and a most interesting one:
- first of all, this Me410 is a A-1
- secondly, when this Me410 had belonged to KG 51, one of the units operating Me410's at night, it is more likely that it had the unit code of KG 51
- so far I never could have traced any pictures of Me410's from the Erprobungskommando 410, a detachment operating Me410's from Venlo airfield in WW-2. As EKdo 410 was an alias for the Me410 in the 1./NJG 1, we know from Flugzeugbestand- und Bewegungsmeldungen of the I./NJG 1 that this nightfighter Gruppe had also some Me410's, according to logbooks however with the unit codes of the 1./NJG 1: G9+_H, not any Stammkennzeichen recorded.

Therefore, one could suspect that this SI+KW belonged to a Luftbeobachterstaffel 7 for instance which operated in southern Germany.

All the best, Marcel Hogenhuis
www.fliegerhorst-venlo.net

[ChristianK]

Hello Marcel,

Luftbeobachterstaffel 7 is an interesting thought. After a quick search I found out that this unit was in existence during the first half of 1944 as kind of a special recon flight for NJG 6. In July 1944 it was disbanded and every Gruppe of NJG 6 received a separate "Führungsschwarm". As SI+KW was found at Schleißheim together with many aircraft from NJG 6 there is indeed a possibility that our Me 410 was attached to this unit for recon or pathfinder duties. This could at least explain its night fighter style camo...

Cheers,
Christian