Jaroslav Lonek

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Jaroslav Lonek (1935)

Jaroslav Lonek (born December 22, 1904 in Chrudim , † January 26, 1945 in Dresden ) was a Czechoslovak aircraft designer , pilot and resistance fighter against National Socialism .

Life

Jaroslav Lonek's aircraft developments (selection)
image Aircraft type Remarks
Zlín Z-IX first powered airplane from Zlín
Zlin Z-XII (Kbely) .JPG Zlín Z-XII two-seat monoplane
1937 Zlin Z-XIII, OK-TBZ pic1.JPG Zlín Z-XIII Liaison aircraft , low wing aircraft

Lonek was born in 1904 to the postal inspector Joseph Lonek and his wife Maria (née Sela). After finishing school in Pardubice , he trained as a precision mechanic . He then did his military service from 1924 to 1926 in the Czechoslovak Air Force, where he obtained his pilot's license. At the end of the 1920s he was a founding member of the Aero Club East in Pardubice, where he also worked as a flight instructor and designer. In 1935 Jaroslav Lonek married his wife Bozena, with whom he later had a daughter.

In the years 1935–1938 he was the chief designer of Zlínská letecká akciová společnost (Zlín Air Transport Company, also: ZLAS), which today operates as ZLIN AIRCRAFT as Otrokovice , or Zlín for short. The Z-IX sports aircraft , the successful two-seat monoplane Zlín Z-XII and the Zlín Z-XIII were built according to his plans . In 1938 he left the factory.

On September 23, 1938 a general mobilization of the Czechoslovak army was declared. Jaroslav Lonek was drafted into the aviation regiment in Hradec Králové .

After the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia , he fled to Poland and, as a result of the Second World War that broke out in September 1939, finally to the Soviet Union , where he was trained as a parachutist . Together with the pilots Radoslav Selucký, Jan Vycpálek, Vladislav Bobák and Miloslav Hůla, Lonek was deposed as an agent behind the enemy lines. One of the aims was to spy out German troop movements and armaments projects in the area of ​​the Protectorate. Together they succeeded in creating an espionage network covering almost the entire area of ​​the Protectorate. Their information was transmitted, among other things, by means of encrypted messages, for which Selucký and Hůla were specially trained as radio operators who both mastered Morse code and were able to build appropriate radio equipment. Material samples, drawings, documents and the like were carried out of the country via the network.

At the beginning of 1941, betrayed by Jaroslav Bednář, who worked for the Gestapo , and discovered by the Germans, Lonek, like many others in the network, was arrested and finally sentenced to death in 1943 . Lonek was executed in Dresden on January 26, 1945 .

Honor and commemoration

For his heroism in the resistance against National Socialism , Jaroslav Lonek was posthumously awarded the Czechoslovak War Cross in 1939 after the war .

In addition, Lonkova Street was named after him in his hometown of Pardubice .

In 1979, the GDR military publisher published the paperback The Command of the Brave by František Kavan, which tells of the struggle and work of the Pardubice spy network around Jaroslav Lonek. In the original language it appeared under the title Komando statečnych . And also the Czech non-fiction author and radio presenter Dr. Josef Daneš († 1999) reported in his book Za tajemstvím éteru , published in 1985, on the work of the network and its later break-up by the Gestapo.

Web links

Commons : Jaroslav Lonek  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Footnotes and individual references

  1. ↑ a b BOČEK, Petr .: Jaroslav Lonek a jeho pardubická letadla . Homepage of Klub přátel Pardubicka , July 24, 2009, accessed on October 31, 2009.
  2. ↑ a b c Jaroslav Lonek at http://www.kppardubicka.cz/cs/menu/zprava/911-osobnosti-pardubicka-jaroslav-lonek/ , accessed on May 25, 2016
  3. ↑ Jaroslav Lonek on the homepage of Aeroklub Chrudim , accessed on October 31, 2009.
  4. ↑ Street names in Pardubice , accessed on May 27, 2016
  5. ↑ František Kavan: The command of the brave . Military publishing house of the GDR, 1979 (Czech: Komando statečnych . Prague. Translated by Ruth Kassube).
  6. ↑ Dr. Ing. Josef Daneš: Za tajemstvím éteru. (Nakladatelství dopravy a spojů - Praha, 1985) ( Archive link ( Memento from June 8, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) pp. 146–157)
  7. ↑ Dr. Josef Danes dies - Radio Prag in Funkamateur , 1/00, p. 32
personal data
SURNAME Lonek, Jaroslav
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czechoslovak aircraft designer, pilot and resistance fighter against National Socialism
DATE OF BIRTH December 22, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Chrudim
DATE OF DEATH January 26, 1945
Place of death Dresden