a 10yr update on some luftwaffe relics

[Danmark]

About 10 years back ( have I been here that long!! ) I made a thread on the Luftwaffe crash relics I had collected ( and mostly still have )
Relics from the Luftwaffe

On the last page are some parts from a Ju88 G-6 night fighter. These parts are some of the remains of Ju 88 G-6 which was the night fighter version of the G-1, but fitted with two Jumo 213 A engines. This aircraft crashed in the Teutoburg forest near Osnabruck Germany during the night of 3rd – 4th March 1945 because of low fuel / fuel issues. The crew of 3 safely bailed out. These parts were recovered from the forest floor between 2005 / 2006 by a local detectorist.

My source at the time who dug the parts told me that it was Ju 88 G-6 werk number 622132 flown by Oberfedwebel Kurt Gabler with Uffz Licht & Ernst as crew.



But then a member of the forum pointed me to a Dutch study group who had a different story Home
They had OFW Kurt Gabler crashing in Holland after ‘Operation Gisela’ that night.



By way of background, Operation Gisela was a German night-fighter intruder operation organised to target British bombers on their way back to England from an attack on Dortmund on the night of 3rd/4th March 1945. For 'Gisela', the Luftwaffe launched about 200 night-fighters to follow the various bomber forces back to England. This offensive took the British defenses largely by surprise and the Germans shot down 24 Allied bombers in a series of attacks over the English coast during the course of the night. By 02:15 the main attacks had occurred and the intruders had spent nearly 2 hours in British airspace.

Now the flight had to journey back over the sea to Germany and the Netherlands. Of the 200 sent, five Ju 88s had been lost in combat over England, 11 aircraft crashed or were damaged on landing, several Ju 88s were chased out to sea and two were shot down. Two Ju 88s crashed while making ground attacks on targets of opportunity, with 20 Ju88s being lost in total.

An online record has Gabler’s plane as one of them….
Junkers Ju 88G-6 Werknummer 622132 I./NJG 4 Crew baled out owing to fuel exhaustion. Ofw K. Gabler injured, rest of crew safe.

I do like the level of detail in the Dutch study group's report but I do find a few things puzzling. I have read that I/NJG 4 was based in Vechta ( southwest of Bremen ) from 11/44 to 3/45 but if they did indeed participate in Operation Gisela as the record indicates and were returning there but at 0245 the plane was abandoned because of low fuel over Berensbruck ( in Germany but 20km to the southwest of the airfield ), WHY and HOW did it then seemingly about face and travel back 150kms southwest into Holland to eventually crash at Zuidloo??? It seems impossible that an unmanned, out of fuel plane could travel that far.

Here are some facts -
The flight left English airspace around 2.15am and the aircraft was abandoned at 2.45am ( 30 min later ) and crashed at 3.30am ( 45 min later ) FACT
The straight line distance from Berensbruck to Zuidloo is 150km – therefore it would have to be flying at 200kph but unmanned and with low or no fuel ??
And then as the stall speed of a JU88 is 145kph… how could that 45min flight be sustained?........... I believe it couldn’t have.

Additionally, while the record seem to be reliable as they are based on the 'flugbuch' from one of the crew members (Uffz. Ernst) he would only have known what the mission was, where they flew from, to and where they parachuted out …. he would NOT have known where the plane ended up!!

????????????

Here then is MY scenario…

They did indeed participate in Operation Gisela and were returning to their base at Vechta – the aircraft was over the North sea having passed the English coast around 2.00am and 45min later were back within 20km of the Vechta airfield when the fuel finally ran out and the order was given to abandon the plane over Bersenbrucke in the pitch dark. As the airmen drifted to earth, the plane slowly banked to the right and took a south heading for about 20km and crashed into the dense Teutoburg forest south of Osnabruck.

The Holland crash was another JU88....

So, am I and my finder correct ? ( I have long since lost communication with them sadly ) or is the "official" report correct?

Love to hear your thoughts.
Cheers, Dan

[Danmark]

44 views and a handful of likes ....... thanks fellas - I guess that's a tacit agreement that my theory holds water?

[BlackCat1982]

44 views and a handful of likes ....... thanks fellas - I guess that's a tacit agreement that my theory holds water?

I agree with your hypothesis. I dug a site with a similar background story (i.e Mine was a USAAF bomber that crashed miles from where it was "supposed to be" due to it being unmanned and out of fuel). The explanation I came up with at the time was that as each engine in turn became starved of fuel any "flight path" would have been subject to deviation. Subsequently I got access to crash site pictures, which clearly showed the bomber had broken up in the air before coming down in woodland.

I agree that your Ju88 is unlikely to have remained in the air for 45 minutes without a pilot.