Dieter Schmitt (pilot)

Dieter Schmitt (born June 1, 1924 in Heidelberg ; † May 27, 2013 ibid) was a German ferry pilot who transported propeller aircraft from manufacturers in the USA to Europe well into old age, setting over a hundred civilian world records - mostly long-distance non-stop records. Solo flight - set up.

Life

Schmitt made his glider license at the age of 14. During the Second World War he became a fighter pilot on the Fw 190 and the first jet fighter, the Me 262 . He left the Bundeswehr as a lieutenant colonel with a test pilot license, 1st class, and then obtained the civilian air traffic pilot ATPL .

In 1965 Schmitt founded his company "Trans World Ferry" in Heidelberg. The task of the one-man company was to fly single and twin-engine aircraft from US-based manufacturers such as Cessna , Beechcraft or Piper to Europe. In addition, he tested more than 150 different types of aircraft, mostly on behalf of manufacturers or licensing authorities.

Transatlantic flights

Schmitt flew alone, there would have been no room for a second pilot either. For the ferry flights, seats and panels were removed and additional tanks were installed, and long-distance equipment such as shortwave devices (HF), radio compass , transponders (if not already available), various navigation devices such as LORAN , a precision approach aid ILS , at least one automatic one Emergency transmitter, inflatable boat, life jacket, emergency rocket and cold protection suit.

For flights from the USA to Europe via the North Atlantic, Schmitt decided on one of these three routes:

• North route from Happy Valley-Goose Bay to Labrador with intermediate refueling in Reykjavík , Iceland.
• Middle Route from Gander , Newfoundland, with a stopover in Shannon , Ireland.
• South route also starts in Gander, but has a stopover in Santa Maria, Azores.

Which one he chose depended on the characteristics of the aircraft and its range, but especially on the weather. The longest section had to be overcome on the middle route, the north route was in danger of freezing in winter, and on the south route there would be violent thunderstorms. Around 15,000 small aircraft crossed the Atlantic from the USA in the 1960s and 1970s; today there are fewer than 1,000.

In the course of his numerous ferry flights, he repeatedly broke route records. Schmitt transferred a total of 357 single-engine aircraft from the USA via the North Atlantic to Europe, and 21 single-engine aircraft from the USA via the Pacific to Asia. In his book “North Pole Flight” he summarized his memories of an aviation life.

At the end of his life he had 25,000 flight hours in his logbooks , flown 333 types of aircraft - single- to four-engine, gliders, propeller and turbo- planes, land and seaplanes - and had 101 records recognized. There are over 150 test reports for gliders, single and multi-engine land and seaplanes as well as special aircraft from his work as a test pilot. On July 19, 2000, at the age of 76, he took off in a single-engine Beech Bonanza for the flight from Nuremberg to Oshkosh , Wisconsin - but not alone and in stages.

Records (selection)

• In 1978 Schmitt was the first to fly a single-engine machine, a Beechcraft Bonanza B 36 , non-stop over the North Pole. The flight went from Anchorage , Alaska to Munich-Riem and lasted 33 hours.
• For the International Aerospace Exhibition (ILA) , which took place in Berlin for the first time in 64 years, Schmitt traveled with a brand new single-engine bonanza from New York, which he transported non-stop to Germany in over 20 hours of flight time. It was the 313rd Atlantic overpass for the then 68-year-old and at the same time another record.

Awards (selection)

• 1977: Lindbergh Memorial Medal (as the only non-American)
• 1986: Federal Cross of Merit on ribbon

Publications

• Dieter Schmitt: North Pole Flight, Motorbuch-Verlag Stuttgart, 1982, ISBN 978-3879438822
• My encounter with Dieter Schmitt , flight captain Peter Klant in pilot and airplane 9/2014
• Dieter Schmitt flew to Oshkosh , AOPA letter 1/2001
• "World records are not an end in themselves " , Aerokurier , August 1979
• Expert for the most difficult jobs , pilot magazine 1/80
• Alone with the bonanza around the globe , Jägerblatt 6/97
• SOS over the Pacific , MARE 16/1999

Film reports

• Lindbergh memory flight , ZDF, 1977
• Alone over the North Pole , ARD, 1978
• 18 hours daily work , SWF, 1985

Web links

• Literature by and about Dieter Schmitt in the catalog of the German National Library

Others

Schmitt is not to be confused with the night fighter pilot and Knight Cross winner Dietrich "Dieter" Schmidt († March 6, 2001/2002), who was born in Karlsruhe on June 27, 1919.

Individual evidence

1. ^ SOS over the Pacific , MARE 16/1999
2. ^ Obituary for Dieter Schmitt, accessed on December 29, 2015
3. ↑ Pilot and Aircraft 9/13, page 99
4. ↑ Flying magazine, September 1992, page 39