The Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor was a Transport aircraft passengers or freight in 1938, converted reconnaissance aircraft during the Second world war.
History
Civil use
At the end of the Years 1930, many airline companies tried to establish regular commercial lines above the North Atlantic. The plane which was about to make a success of this task was Focke-Wulf Fw 200, conceived in 1936. Monoplane with low aerofoil of entirely metal construction, this apparatus, which was able to carry 26 passengers, accomplished its first flight, under the designation of Fw 200V-1, in July 1937, with four radial engine Pratt & Whitney Hornet of 875 ch. Huit Fw 200A to average range operating, equipped with radial engines BMW 132G-1, left the four, assembly lines then being taken into account by the Lufthansa, two by Danish Air Lines, and two by Syndicato Condor, with the Brésil. Fw 200V-1, transformed into Fw 200S-1 with long mail, connected Berlin to New York without stopover in August 1938 in 24,5 hours.
Military use
During the Second world war, Fw 200 was modified for the needs for Luftwaffe. It was particularly well adapted to the reconnaissance missions in open sea and like bomber. It was implemented in team with the submarines.
These Fw 200, which was called " plague of the Atlantic " by Churchill, tens of allied trading vessels ran when they were used as patrol craft/bombers above the Atlantic until 1943.
Conversion in the bombers started in 1939 at the request of the Japanese air force. This version was been driven by more powerful engines and was baptized Fw 200 C, but the war had started before the end of the development and Luftwaffe made use of the apparatus like Patrouilleur ( Seeaufklärer ). Meanwhile, the civil aircrafts Fw 200 B and the few production aircraft 0 of the version C were requisitioned by the army for the transport of the troops. The series production continued until the beginning of the year 1944 (C-1 models, -2,-3,-4,-6 and -8) for a total quantity of 263 specimens.
Towards the end of the war, when the tactics of attack of Fw 200 lost in effectiveness, some apparatuses were reserved to ensure displacements of Hitler and its staff. Aircraft “VIP” Fw 200 C-4/U1 (n° of series 0137) CE+IB, was equipped with a special armchair provided with a parachute, installed above a trap door, which could have made it possible the Führer to evacuate the plane in the event of distress. A version having a greater scale and been driven by V-engines moreover baptized great power Fw 300 did not exceed the stage of the drawing.
Restoration of the only existing specimen
During the countryside of Norway, an apparatus in military version (C3) controlled by the captain Werner Thieme knew problems of high-lift wings (only one left side!) during the approach on February 22nd, 1942 close to Trondheim and the plane had to be posed in catastrophe in the Fjord. The 6 team members survived but the apparatus remained by 60 m basic until 1999, year of its discovery and sound " rescue ".The damaged carcass, of which 20% only are reusable, belongs to the museum of the aeronautical techniques Berliner Deutsches Technikmuseum in Berlin (DTMB). The factory Airbus of Bremen (in the past Focke-Wulf) gives in state the cell using reprocessed voluntary technicians (certain old of some 80 years!) old of F. - W. the Gear landing and the empennage are given in state at Lufthansa - Technik with Hamburg. An engine BMW Bramo 323 R- 2 - is reconstituted part after part in the factory Rolls-Royce (in the past MTU) of Oberursel (close to Francfort-sur-le-Main) but it does not come from this apparatus: the four engines were in a too bad state of conservation.
The finished apparatus - although previously pertaining to the Wehrmacht - will be then exposed to the museum in civil version, without military camouflage nor registration. The old driver, Thieme, 92 years old (in 2007), will however probably not attend the end of work, envisaged about 2025.
(Source: Süddeutsche Zeitung of the 9 & June 10th, 2007, page V 2/4)
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