Richthofen (ship)
The Richthofen was an air traffic control ship of the German Air Force in World War II . Sister ships were the Hans Albrecht Wedel and the unfinished Hermann Köhl ; two originally planned ships of this class K VI were no longer in Kiel set. The ships were slightly larger than the four ships of the previous KV class ( Karl Meyer , Max Stinsky , Immelmann , and Boelcke ).
Construction and technical data
The ship was in 1940 when F. Schichau shipyard in Pillau placed with the hull number 1526 in Kiel and ran on March 1, 1942 by Stack . It was 83.8 meters long and 11 m wide, had a 3.4 m draft and displaced 1,215 tons (standard) and 1,375 tons (maximum). Four MAN 12-cylinder four-stroke diesel engines, each with 2,200 horsepower, drove two screws via two Vulkan gears and gave the ship a top speed of 21.5 knots . With its maximum of 120 tons of diesel fuel, the ship's range was 4100 nautical miles at 16 knots cruising speed. The ship had a Kampnagel - aircraft crane record with 18 tons of lifting force and could be up to three aircraft simultaneously or transport. It could hold up to 80 tons of aviation fuel . The armament consisted of three 3.7 cm and two 2 cm anti -aircraft guns. The crew consisted of 8 officers and 58 men.
fate
The ship was put into service in May 1943 and initially assigned to the Luftwaffe's sea testing site in Travemünde . In the same summer it was subordinated to the "Maritime Emergency Service Leader 3 (West)" in France, where it was operated from then on in the Brittany / Biscay area .
On the night of 14 August 15, 1944, was Richthofen , along with the torpedo boat T 24 , the minesweepers M 275 and M 385 and the Sperrbrecher 157 , by British light cruiser Mauritius , the destroyer Ursa and the Canadian destroyer Iroqois attacked . The barrier breaker was sunk in the process, and the two minesweepers had to be beached or abandoned, badly damaged.
On April 20, 1945 the ship was interned in Pasajes (Spain). After the end of the war it was delivered to Great Britain in December 1945 and handed over to the Soviet Union as reparation payment in March 1946 , in whose navy it was then used under the name of Chibiny . The final whereabouts are not known.
literature
- Volkmar Kühn (di Franz Kurowski ): The sea emergency service of the German Air Force 1939–1945 . Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3879435642 , ISBN 978-3879435647 .
- Dieter Jung, Berndt Wenzel, Arno Abendroth: Ships and boats of the German sea pilots 1912-1976 . 1st edition, Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1977.
- Erich Gröner : The German Warships 1815-1945 , Volume 7.