Rybin, Y. Luftwaffe ace Walter Schuck researched / Christer Bergstrom, Yuriy Rybin. - Sweden : [s. l.], 2019. - 190 p. : ill.

WALTER SCHUCK Walter Schuck and hisfirst mechanic. Petsamo, March 1944. A III./JG 5 Me 109 returns from a combat mission. prove to be the case, it is possible that Jockel Norz - who was credited with two of the five Airacobras which were claimed on that mission - shot him down. That would in turn mean that Norz was responsible for the killing of two 255 IAP commanders on the same day. In any case, 17 March 1944 was a very successful day for Jockel Norz, who by achieving five victories reached a tally of 70. This granted Norz his Knight’s Cross award a few days later. But the successes attained on 17 March 1944 by the “Eismeerjager” - the “Arctic Ocean fighters,” as they now were called - had not been attained without a cost. At least three of III./JG 5’s Me 109s were lost, as were two pilots - Leutnant Bernhard von Hermann and Feldwebel Werner Hakenjos. Also, III./JG 5 could have been expected to have been more effective in providing the ships with air cover. Six days later, III./JG 5 again displayed its lack­ ing ability to protect the coastal convoys when 9 GMTAP’s torpedo planes hit and sank the German patrol boat V 6109 in the Bay o f Busse. In return, JG 5 could file no more than a single victory claim - a Yak-9 by Schuck. These Soviet air operations should be compared with the Luftwaffe’s inability to do any harm to the next Allied Lend Lease convoy, which left Loch Ewe in Scot­ land on 27 March. German aerial reconnaissance spot­ ted the convoy three days later - only to find out that it was provided with an overwhelming escort, includ­ ing the bulk o f the British Home Fleet. The Ju 88 of 1./ FAGr 22 which discovered the ships was intercepted and shot down by Grumman Martlet fighter planes from the escort carriers Tracker and Activity. Next day, the same Royal Navy fighters shot down three four-engined Fw 200s of 3./KG 40. On 1 April they destroyed a BV 138 flying boat from l./SAGr 130, and on 2 April the Mart­ lets knocked down a Ju 88 of l./FAGr 124. On 3 April, the aircraft from the British aircraft car­ riers were in both offensive and defensive action. For­ ty-one Fairey Barracuda bombers surprisingly attacked the Tirpitz in the Alta fiord, hitting the battleship with fourteen bombs which killed 122 men and injured 316, and rendered the pride of the German Navy unservicea­ ble for three months. Meanwhile, other planes from the British carriers participated in the destruction of Ger­ man U-boats. Since both reconnaissance aircraft and U-boats had been driven off by the carrier planes, III./JG 5 was instructed to fly a reconnaissance mission to Murmansk and check if the convoy had arrived yet. Ehrler assigned the task to Schuck. By that time, the melting snow had again turned the ordinary runway at Petsamo into a marshland, and only the plank covered runway could be used. But when Schuck got his mission order, strong winds were blowing in from the sea. He objected to Ehrler, pointing out the risk that his aircraft during take off would be flung by the winds into the ten-foot snow