Ju 86 P loss(es) on 15 April 1941 in Ukraine

[Chris Going]

You’re very welcome Juha.

I must add a correction. I cited the 17th April sortie plot as SU 1441, but its SU 1339. Sortie SU 1441 is dated 5th June 1941. Either way, by April 18th the sortie number was SU 1344, and by May 28th had climbed to SU 1393 -mostly, I think, sorties into the Western Special Military District and the Kiev district.
Incidentally, those working on sortie tallies (like er, me) need to have a care. I’m coming across garbled entries on the DoD SIS Degree Square overlays, with some films clearly taken on the same flight, apparently getting sequential ‘F’ Numbers. This is messing up my estimations of actual sortie rates. This is something I’d have asked Roy Stanley about if I’d known before…
Keep well everyone -if you can
ChrisG

[Juha]

Hello Jim
thanks for the new lead!
Unfortunately Khazanov & Medved in their MiG-3 Aces of World War 2 mention only the 10 April case when 3 MiG-3s from 31st IAP tried to intercept an unidentified a/c flying at 11.000 m (so probably a Ju 86 P) in the Kaunas area, all 3 MiGs stalled into a spin and two of them were lost and one pilot killed, the other pilot bailed out. Hopefully our Russian experts can tell more.

Hello Chris
Very interesting!
According to Timin the Commander of the Air Forces of the Red Army Lt.Gen Zhigaryev reported to Marshall Timoshenko on 17 June 1941 that in the period from 1 January to 10 June 1941 there were 122 incidents of foreign a/c crossing the state border of the USSR.

Juha

[Chris Going]

Juha, Hi,

…looking again at the TsAMO Stabia OKH plots I think we can identify a likely candidate for the GAF overflight which 31st IAP unsuccessfully tried to intercept. This is SU 1326, which passed westwards over Kaunas on April 10th 1941. It was equipped with three cameras (S,R,L) the imagery from which was plotted by V Abteilung. They are to be seen in TsAMO Fond 500, 12451, Akte 837, frames 50-52. Slight mystery: the ‘Spektrum’ installation (plot on scan 51) is cited as returning imagery at 1:15,000, while the R and L scale is 12,000. The plots are all pretty congruent indicating one pass, but what was the f/l used on ‘S’?
Knowing the crash locations of the two Mig-3 could help confirm this was the a/c involved.

Best

ChrisG

[Juha]

Hello Chris
no info on the MiG crash locations but Timin gives the route of the German high flyer as noted by Soviets as at 1128 hrs crossed the state border to the W of Shaki, and after having passed over Ligaine (25 km NW of Kaunas), Ariogala (50 km NW of Kaunas) the a/c flew back to German territory over Virbalis.

Juha

[Chris Going]

Juha,

Very useful this, I have F1131 dated 17th March 1941 (plot in TsAMO, Print set survives in US); rising to 'SU 1462' on 9 June 1941. In other words, during this three month period ObdL flew 331 sorties. If Lt.Gen Zhigaryev reported 122 incursions in this period (or longer, given that it was from January) the same sequence was surely used to index all ObDL strategic sorties. I've got some 1940 and 1941 UK overflight dates. Ill check to see if they mesh. More later...

Best

ChrisG

[Mikael Olrog]

Hi Guys, just want to highlight that the cameras used on Ju 86 P-1 was 3 Rb 75/30, with only two Rb 75/30 kept on the Ju 86 P-3.


The Do 215 B-4 on the other hand had two Rb 50/30 and one Rb 20/30 - which could explain why the S (Senkrecht) would have a different scale than the right and left cameras. Just raising the issue that there is no information on the plots divulging the type of aircraft used for the flight (unfortunately). Since also other types of aircraft were used for these overflights, I'd be hestiant to tie the plots to an aircraft type unless it can be verified by e.g. flugbuch entry or similiar confirming the geographical route.

[Chris Going]

Hi Mikael!

Used as I am to endlessly seeing the notations SK, SG, and SD, I'm glad to learn that the single letter 'S' in the notation R S L stands for Senkrecht. So, thank you.

Some of the 1939 AObdL plots I've seen have a camera position 'M': if you have an expansion of that I'd like to know. I'm assuming its a bit like the first V in the American 'VV', for ventral vertical?

with Best wishes

ChrisG

[Mirek Wawrzynski]

"Lejt. Schounov of 46 IAP as Flight Commander in a MiG-3"

I still maintain what I once wrote, except that this lt. Schounov pilot was on the I-16 type 5, and not on the MiG-3. The MiG-3 fighters did not enter service with the 46 IAP, i.e. April 1941, a new type, still unreliable, with various technical and design problems.

As I remember correctly, the pilot even fired a short series of one Ju 86 engine, the other engine was turned off by the crew and had to lower the flight trying to reach its territory at low altitude and make an emergency landing there. Here I might be wrong. The crew had previously been intercepted and landed on the Soviet side.


R.
mirekw

[Mirek Wawrzynski]

A few corrections and additions



On April 15, 1941, about 10 kilometers south of Równo, the Ju 86 P-2 crashed at about 4:20 pm. The Soviet WNOS posts spotted around 4 p.m. a twin-engine plane flying from the east through Szepietówka towards Łuck. The Russians sent to intercept an unknown intruder, an inspector following the pilot technique of senior lieutenant P.M. Szałunow in I-16 type 5 (old version, not new one like type 24 or 27, or 29 ) from the 46th IAP from the 14th SAD. This fighter regiment stood at Dubno airfield in Kiev Special Military District.



The German crew had to turn off the right engine on their Ju 86 due to a malfunction. The Germans tried to reach their own area at low altitude. They ran out of luck. At an altitude of about 500 meters, Szałunow intercepted the intruder and forced the crew to make an emergency landing around 16.20-16.30 Moscow time.



After the outbreak of the war, the Germans were miraculously not shot in the Równo (Rivne) prison and managed to free and return on 25 June 1941. This crew was very, very lucky. After June 22, 1941, NKVD prison units killed all political prisoners, conspirators, and other hostile elements in their all prisons and pre-trial detention centers. In the short perion (23-30 June) there were killed about, at least 10 000 prisoners. Probably this figure is a little bit higher then 10 000 killed?



R.
mirekw

[Juha]

Hello Mirek!
Thank you very much for your reply, very interesting information. I would like to further clarify how Szałunow forced the Ju 86 crew to land. Simply by flying next to it and signalling by hand? This alone may have been enough to the crew of the Junkers that flew with only one engine running and was still about 150 km from the German-controlled area. In that situation, the appearance of a Russian fighter on the wing may well be enough to show that their situation was hopeless. Or just firing warning bursts or even firing at the only working engine?

TIA
Juha