Hans Deutschmann

Hans Deutschmann (born September 19, 1911 in Kuchelberg , Krs. Liegnitz / Silesia; † April 11, 1942 in Rennes ) was a German glider pioneer , test pilot , graduate engineer and holder of the silver glider badge No. 30.

biography

Born on September 19, 1911 in a small town near Liegnitz / Silesia, Hans Deutschmann is the son of the village school teacher August Deutschmann, who was transferred to Grunau in the Giant Mountains in 1925 . The high school student Hans Deutschmann followed the development of the Grunau gliding school (from 1923) with great interest and let himself be carried away by the enthusiasm for flying at that time. In Grunau, three Swabian glider pioneers had done a great job: the designers Espenlaub and Schneider ( Grunau Baby ) and the well-known Wolf Hirthwho, after sailing over New York, took over the Grunau gliding school in 1931 and expanded it to become the leading German glider training center.

Hans Deutschmann spent most of his free time on the "Fliegerberg" of his home village and became an enthusiastic glider pilot himself at a young age. Before Wolf Hirth arrived in Grunau, whom he later greatly admired, Hans Deutschmann passed the Glider Pilot C exam. His school leaving certificate from the Hirschberg Humanist High School contained a corresponding note. Excellent grades in the natural sciences, as well as his specialty "Technology" in Greek, suggest studying at the TH Breslau , which he started in the winter semester 1930/31 ( aerodynamics ). Gliding was continued alongside my studies. 1931–1933 he took part in the Rhön competition . Spectacular end to his Rhön adventure: On August 13, 1933, he and the “Schlesien in Not” got caught in a thunderstorm, which burst his plane and threw him out, which he survived slightly injured. On March 10, 1933, Hans Deutschmann did one for gliding like A significant discovery for meteorology as well : Flying with a Grunau Baby I on the north side of the Giant Mountains in Silesia, it was unexpectedly carried by strong updrafts to an altitude of 3000 to 4000 m. Uncertain interpretations of the event were confirmed by later scientific investigations, especially by Joachim Kuettner , that these were atmospheric gravity waves ( lee waves ). In the thirties it was then also possible to explain cloud formations shrouded in mystery such as the Moazagotl . As a stationary lenticular cloud above a gravity wave mountain, it has been approached by glider pilots all over the world since then and is a guarantee for great heights and expanses.

In the following years Hans Deutschmann turned to powered flight. Here too he wanted to break new ground and made himself available to Alexander Lippisch as a test pilot. With the experimental flying wing "Delta I" he had a serious accident on the Rhön in September 1933 and was in a Fulda clinic until Easter 1934. Hardly recovered, he acquired the silver C badge in gliding in July 1934, it was the 30th award in the German Reich.

From 1935 Deutschmann devoted himself more to his studies in Breslau . Because he could not stop flying completely, he worked as a weather pilot and became a glider consultant for Lower Silesia. In 1937 he was already runner-up in the Deutschlandflug , which he won a year later with the Stieglitz-Verband ( Fw 44 ) of the Wroclaw Aviation School. In 1938, more than 400 aircraft took part in this major aviation event. The flight to Germany planned for 1939 no longer took place due to the war.

Deutschmann finished his studies in spring 1939 with a thesis on tailless powered flight and then worked as a test pilot for various aircraft manufacturers, e. B. Heinkel in Rostock . Married since 1938, he found a job as an aviation chief engineer at the Rechlin test center of the National Socialist Air Force . Since the testing of new developments by German aircraft manufacturers and later also of captured aircraft was subject to strict secrecy, little is known about the work there. Flight reports from Rechlin show, however, that Deutschmann was involved in pioneering designs. For example, on September 22, 1940, as a pilot of a Heinkel He 111, he helped the world's first twin-engine jet aircraft - the He 280 did not yet have any engines - on its maiden flight.

Why Deutschmann took part in a mission of Kampfgeschwader 40 on April 10, 1942 as the 2nd pilot in a Fw 200 "Condor" is unknown. The plane was supposed to carry out armed reconnaissance on the Spanish-Portuguese coast. In the early morning hours of April 11, 1942, after returning to the Rennes airport in northern France, the aircraft was destroyed by touching the ground while floating in for landing. Of the seven-man crew, only three survive, Deutschmann was among the four dead. Posthumously, he was promoted to pilot staff engineer.

swell

• Paul Karlson: Sailors through wind and clouds , Ullstein Verlag Berlin 1933
• Flight reports Rechlin (testing of the He 280), September 22 - October 29, 1940
• Wilhelm Sachsenberg: Then and Now - The History of the Flight to Germany , 1971
• Peter Riedel: About sunny expanses , Motorbuch Verlag Stuttgart 1985
• A. Dörnbrack, R. Heise, JP Kuettner: Wellen und Roten , in: promet , Volume 32, Issue 1/2, 2006, pp. 18–24