Wednesday 25 February 2015

French flying boats of WWII Ebay photo find # 30 - Seeflieger album - Breguet Br 521 Bizerte, Bv 138, He 115


Spotted on ebay with four days still to bid, currently at around 500 euros. An album featuring some nice images of Luftwaffe seaplane types photographed in Holtenau and Brest, France..




Above; two views of the rather ungainly "nose" of a Breguet 521 Bizerte - a feature which proved very useful for observation tasks while the aircraft was in flight. Note the defensive position to the right of the cockpit. Following the armistice at the end of the Westfeldzug (campaign in the West) the Germans had an urgent requirement for air-sea rescue seaplanes along the French Atlantic and Channel coastlines. Bizerte seaplanes were sold to the Germans by the Vichy government during the summer of 1940. The first loss of a Bizerte was SG+FM (N° 11), launched on 16 November 1940 to look for the crew of a KG 100 He 111 and intercepted and shot down by a N° 236 (Coastal Command) Squadron Blenheim. As of April 1944 the Luftwaffe Seenot Staffeln had just five Bizertes on strength, two with 3. Seenot at Berre (N° 20 and ??) and three with 1. Seenotstaffel (N° 3, 4 and 36) at Biscarosse. With the Allied landings in Provence during August 1944, both Staffeln were ordered back to Germany. At least one of these machines (N° 4) remained in France to be incorporated back into the French naval air arm with 30S post-war. Bizerte flying boats were based in Hourtin (Atlantic coast, north of Bordeaux) and Brest among others. It was in Hourtin that Leutnante Klingspor and Unterhorst first arrived on 30 July 1940 with two crews to take possession of Bizertes N° 11 and 34 abandoned on 18 June. Both machines were repainted in German colours and flew into Lanvéoc-Poulmic (Brest, southern Brittany) on 7 August 1940..

more Bizerte pictures below including  rare cockpit shot, and some shots of Bv 138s












The original Ebay link to the sale is here