Kurt Gotze

Kurt Götze (born July 27, 1922 in Dresden ; † September 16, 2018 in Meißen ) was a German military pilot in World War II and one of the first glider pilots in the GDR after it had ended . He gained notoriety in particular through the first national record he had flown in gliding and through his work as a test pilot , during which he tried out most of the types of gliders developed in the GDR .

Life

Second World War

Götze joined the German Air Sports Association in 1937 at the age of 14 , where he learned to fly on the Dresdner Heller and in 1940 obtained the C test in Kamenz and the L 1 pilot's license in Bautzen-Stiebitz. In 1941 he received his license as a gliding instructor and then completed a course in cargo glider preschool at the Reichsegelflugschule in Grunau . In the same year he finished a four-year apprenticeship as an orthopedic mechanic and shortly afterwards received his draft into the air force of the Wehrmacht . Despite his poor eyesight, Götze was wearing glasses, he received the certificate of fitness as a pilot at the second attempt and was transferred to the flight candidate battalion II in Straubing and later to the A / B pilot school in Pilsen , where his engine flight training was carried out and he received his blind flight license at the beginning of 1943 of the C-license in blind flight I and II. After completing his training, Götze was transferred to France to the Schnellkampfgeschwader 10 , where he flew missions as an attack pilot. After the regrouping of the association and renaming to Schlachtgeschwader 10 , Götze was deployed in its 3rd squadron on the Eastern Front . In 1944 he was transferred to the defense of the Reich, where he scored his first of five kills, a B-17 , on August 24th . He himself was shot down three times during his 74 combat missions, the last time on January 8, 1945 over Hungary, as a result of which he was taken prisoner by the Soviets. There he was subjected to severe abuse, but managed to escape to his home town of Dresden in October 1945.

Working in the GDR

After the war, flying was initially prohibited in the occupation zones. That's why Götze got a foothold in his civilian profession as an orthopedic mechanic and passed the master's examination. In 1949 he founded an interest group for aviation and campaigned for the re-approval of gliding, which was also granted in 1951 for the following year. In February 1952, the first glider training course took place in Schönhagen in the GDR and Götze acquired flight instructor license No. 1. He then became a flight manager at the former Reichsegelflugschule in Laucha , now a flight school of the Society for Sport and Technology (GST). There he completed a continuous flight of 24.05 hours with a Baby IIb from September 22nd to 23rd, 1952 , the first glider record in the GDR. In 1954 this was stopped by Heinz Fischer, but Götze increased it in the same year from July 18 to 19 to 26.07 hours. He was the holder of the Gold-C badge of achievement with two diamonds . In addition to his job in Laucha, during this time he worked as a one-flyer for the first Patriot glider designed and built in the GDR, as well as for the master craftsman . Due to the increasingly military orientation of aviation at GST and the resulting disputes between Götze and the responsible authorities, he gave up his post at GST in February 1956 and switched to the country's glider industry based in Lommatzsch , but continued to volunteer as a flight instructor and tow pilot active. In the period that followed, until the production of gliders was discontinued in 1965, Götze was responsible for testing the types built in Lommatzsch and often also worked as a one-flyer. So he traveled to Egypt in December 1960 and presented a teacher in Alexandria , who was then given as a gift to Egyptian aviators. Until 1972 he was also head of the customer service department. Several times he took part in motor and glider competitions between 1956 and 1970. In 1977 he had to give up flying because of his poor eyesight and subsequently campaigned for the approval of hang gliding in the GDR, albeit in vain, and practiced this sport illegally in the ČSSR several times .

After the political turnaround , he regained his fitness to fly and continued to fly until 2001. In 1993 he was accepted into the traditional old eagle community.

literature

• Kurt Götze: My work in GDR aviation. In: Frank-Dieter Lemke: 16. Small old-timer sailplane meeting Oschatz 2012. Berlin 2013, p. 8 ( digitalisat / PDF ).
• Frank-Dieter Lemke: Glider construction in the GDR . Ideas and projects - replicas and new constructions. Rockstuhl, Bad Langensalza 2018, ISBN 978-3-95966-303-8 .
• Jörg Mückler: Air sports in the GDR. The beginnings with FDJ and GST . In: Fliegerrevue Extra . No. 8 . Möller, 2005, p. 15 .

Web links

• We say goodbye. Kurt Götze - a passionate aviator. Retrieved October 20, 2018 (obituary by Monika Warstat). 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kurt Götze: With the "teacher" about Alexandria . In: Deutsche Flugtechnik . No. 7/1961 . Verlag Technik, Berlin 1961, p. 248 ff .
2. ↑ Fliegerrevue No. 11/2018 p. 64 (obituary to Kurt Götze)