Air War WW2 Portal

On november 26th, 2001, the RNethAF Salvage and Recovery Team started the recovery of parts of the Lancaster mk.III ND913 'A4-M' of no. 115 Squadron. The plane crashed in the night of July 21st, 1944 in the 'Oostpolder' near Papendrecht.
The crew of 7 was killed in the crash. They were interred at the General Cemetery at Papendrecht shortly after the crash.
The experts of the RNethAF expects that they will find some explosives like bombs. The aircraft had been loaded with one 4,000 lbs High Capacity Bomb and 16 High Explosive bombs of 500 lbs.

On May 7th 2001, the RNethAF Salvage and Recovery Team started the recovery of parts of the Lancaster R5738 of no.97 Squadron RAF which crashed here in the evening of January 9th 1943. It was shot down by a German nightfighter. The Lancaster had a 4,000 lbs bomb on board. This bomb exploded when the aircraft crashed. A two meter large part of the wing was found together with some smaller explosives

On May 29th 2000, the RNethAF Salvage Team started the recovery of a Lancaster bomber at Amsterdam-Zwanenburg. It's the wreckage of Lancaster JB659 'OF-J' of no. 97 Squadron which crashed here on a farmhouse on January 30th 1944, killing 6 civilians in the farmhouse. There are still FIVE crewmembers missing. One hopes to find the remains of these five airmen.

On August 30th 1999, the RNethAF started the recovery of a Bf109 aircraft at Norg (province of Drenthe) in the hamlet Peest. More specific in the 'Peester Maden'. On the first day the exact location was marked and the first 50 cms. of earth was removed. During digging on the second day (tuesday August 31st) one found the first remains of a human being at a depth of 2 meters.

The Recovery and Identification Service of the Army became involved. Captain Harry Jongen ('the nose') started his investigation of the remains and more remains were found. On wednesday September 1st the identification-disc of the pilot was found. The same day parts of the Messerschmitt were found. On thursday September 2nd the last parts of the Bf109 were found and the recovery came to an end.

Members of our Studygroup Airwar (S. de Vries, L. Schrik, D. Drijver, K. van der Heide, M. Veenstra and K. van der Veen) identified the plane as being a Messerscmitt Bf109G-5Y which crashed on saturday December 11th 1943 into the weak bottom of the 'Peester Maden' near Peest (Norg).

The Pilot was Gefreiter Friedrich König from Berlin. He flew the 'Gelbe 2' of 6./JG3. Wnr. was 26116. The remains of the pilot will be buried at the German War Cemetery at Ysselsteyn (Province of Limburg)

Thanks to the success of this recovery the group of D. Drijver c.s. now also solved another problem. Now they know the name of the pilot of a Messerschmitt Bf109 which crashed at Nijtap. The pilot was buried as an 'unknown German soldier'. The aircraft crashed on the same day as the plane of Friedrich König. König was missing and the other was buried as 'unknown soldier'. They knew that two pilots were still missing. Their names were: König and Benzien. Konstantin Benzien was pilot with JG27 and was a Russian from Minsk. Thanks to the recovery of König the grave of the unknown pilot has finally got a name now.

The sling from the survival-kit was found


Parts of engine and landing gear


The registration disc on this part confirmed that is was really a Bf109


The location of the Bf109 had to be drained


The parachute was found. It was still complete and was almost intact