During 1942 RAF bomber command had mounted several socalled ‘1,000 bomber’ raids and by the spring of 1943 some 65

RAF bomber squadrons stood ready to be deployed in a massive

night-time offensive against the Reich. German night fighter

defences – essentially radar-guided twin-engine machines

operating in individual ‘boxes’ – risked being overwhelmed, as

indeed they were on 24 July 1943, during a huge raid against

the port city of Hamburg. That night, ‘Window’ – tin foil strips

that jammed German radars – was deployed for the first time.

The resulting firestorm, which caused huge loss of civilian life

and damage to industrial installations, prompted the German

High Command to give greater urgency to proposals then being

tested to attack the bombers ‘visually’ – independently of radarguidance - with single engine fighters. Decorated bomber pilot

Oberst Hajo Herrmann had come up with this somewhat ‘harebrained’ scheme during early 1943 as a means of making up for

a general shortage of night fighters. He had suggested that single

seat fighters could operate in the bombers’ general target area

using the light of target indicators, massed searchlights and the

fires on the ground to spot their targets. In an effort to persuade

his commanders of the feasibility of his idea, Herrmann had

himself taken to flying a Focke Wulf 190 at night against RAF

intruders as he related in his memoir ‘Bewegtes Leben’ and

a Versuchseinheit or test unit was quickly established.

Herrmann’s Bonn-Hangelar-based unit was crewed by

experienced ‘blind flyers’, former bomber and Lufthansa

transport pilots. Their first interception of a British heavy

down by Herrmann himself, for the loss of just one machine. As

a result of the British deployment of ‘Window’ over Hamburg,

Herrmann’s pilots suddenly found themselves centre stage

as the only real interim counter measure available to the

Luftwaffe, while German radar research technology strove to

overcome the jamming.

Herrmann’s pilots quickly became specialists in night-time

‘free hunting’ - otherwise dubbed ‘wilde Sau’ or ‘wild boar’

night fighting. The G-5 and G-6 Gustavs employed were of

course ‘pure’ day-fighters with no technical provision for

operating at night whatsoever. A range of modifications proved

necessary as wilde Sau sorties were highly specialized and were

flown under ‘extreme’ conditions (ie total darkness). While

pilots needed to be highly competent, sighting the bombers was

an entirely visual skill. To preserve ‘night vision’, one of the first

modifications was the fitting of exhaust flame ‘shrouds’. Socalled Blendschutzleiste were mounted over both sets of ejector

stacks. Above the target, if it was on fire, the silhouettes of

enemy aircraft stood out against the luminous background, but

violently contrasting lighting conditions – searchlight glare, flak

bursts, smoke and cloud – could easily dazzle a pilot and cause

spatial disorientation. In the cockpit certain instruments were

doubled up on the ‘blind-flying’ panel due to their vulnerability

to combat damage. A cockpit display for the reception of

homing beacon signals transmitted from Hangelar went some

way to facilitating extremely hazardous ‘blind’ landings and

‘precision’ approaches. Wing-tip navigation lights and landing

lights (Bordscheinwerfer) were always extinguished to evade

prowling night-fighters and minimal runway lighting was

illuminated only very briefly so that takeoffs and landings were

carried out most of the time in almost total darkness. Wilde Sau

109s of course carried the standard radio equipment package

Lt. Otto Schwamb of 7./JG 300. The Bf 109G-6 ‘Black 3’ + I was flown by II./JG 302

(Aufsitzer) on loan from 8./JG 54 (blue fuselage band). Note the Blendschutzleiste

glare shield over the exhaust and the Pfeife (whistle) on the first stub of the exhaust

stack. The ‘blind landing’ FuBl 2 antenna can be seen under the fuselage.

bomber raid had taken place on the night of 3-4 July during

an attack on Cologne. Herrmann’s pilots destroyed at least

ten of the twelve bombers shot down, including one brought

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eduard

Fritz Gniffke’s ‘N Yellow 7’ of 6./JG 302.

INFO Eduard - July 2020