Amazing: restored JU-88 with Romanian markings

... is on display at the USAFM (US Air Force Museum, I presume) in Dayton, OH, USA... I guess a road trip is called for... or, is anyone in the neighbourhood? I wouldn't mind seeing some quality pictures of it. Here's the only one I could find:



The picture is taken originally from Preserved Axis Aircraft site: http://www.preservedaxisaircraft.com/Luftw...s/junkers88.htm - click on the Ju 88D-1/Trop link.

This Ju-88D-1 was used to defect by Nicolae Teodor on 27 July 1943 (or 22 July, I do not remember correctly).
He asked for permission to test a Ju-88D-1, which had just been repaired,
but after he took off he immediately headed south from Mariupol. He crossed the Black Sea and reached the Turkish coast near Cape Bafia. After 3 hours he was at Cape Anamur. He then flew about an hour over water, when he spotted land. It was intercepted by RAF fighters and escorted to Limassol. After it landed it had fuel only for another 10 minutes in its tanks.

The airplane is presently in USAAF Museum, but it has wrong markings.

Victor is basically correct. The date of defection was July 22, 1943. The rank of the defector was Serg. maj. TR av.
The original marking of the Ju 88D-1 (W.Nr. 430650) of Escadrila 2 recunoastere was White 1. The size and shape of the "Michael's Cross' are also wrong.
You can see a brighter colour photo of this bird, taken in the open, on the rear cover of my book on the Rumanian Air Force, published by Squadron/Signal, in 1999.

The reco.planes had numbers from 1-99 and bombers from 100-.....

Well we Americans don't know everything! :wink:

Here's another image of the exact same aicraft, it is said that it is "the best Ju-88" still surviving today, ..thanks to our romanian defector.



I heard this aircraft landed in Cyprus at an allied base.. can someone confirm this? (perhaps it was brought later to that base)
*What was the reaction in romania at that time to this defection ? :shock:

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Here's another image of the exact same aicraft, it is said that it is \"the best Ju-88\" still surviving today, ..thanks to our romanian defector.

Actually, it's the ONLY Rumanian origin warplane that survives until today!

Kudos for the museum's current staff, who decided to restore the airplane in its original markings, instead of the fake Luftwaffe markings it previously sported.

Dénes

The dossier of the "defector" Nicolae Teodor is not yet very clear. It seems he carried peace offers from the Romanian Antonescu Governement to be given to the Allies.
We shall have the story in Modelism with all the dossier in March, next year. Documents were ellaborated by Iuliu Maniu. A coppy will be send to the museum in Dayton.
Nicolae was new in the unit and had no friends yet. There are two pictures of the plane in original markings and no.1 white on the fixed rudder.

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I heard this aircraft landed in Cyprus at an allied base.. can someone confirm this? (perhaps it was brought later to that base)

Limassol is in Cyprus.

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Limassol is in Cyprus.  :D

, right.... i missed that.. :?


*Is the plane in flying condition? Can it lift of the ground after 60 years?
:shock:
:?: :?:

I have a copy of the 5-page extensive interrogation report done by the British, dated Aug. 8, 1943.
Serg. av. Teodor stated that he hated the Germans and wanted simply to defect.

Here's an excerpt from the report:

QUOTE

\"This pilot, a Roumanian, who was always anti-German, was annoyed that he had to work under German orders and was indignant at the treatment of his fellow pilots by the German officers. He objected to fighting for Germany and after having carried out a number of sorties, he decided do desert.\"

This guy would have been made a hero in the Post-War Communist era...a True "anti-fascist" resistance fighter and so on...

Maybe he did not HATE germans, (and maybe he did not like them either), but he probably said what he said to please his captors and "appear" to be totally on the allied side.

He was flying a german plane after all...was'nt he? :wink:

Hello everyone, I am a new member but I know this Ju-88 quite well. I live close to WPAFB and visit pretty often. Here is a close up of the fuselage insignia. Since your last photo's the aircraft has been moved to the main museum. The photo above shows the aircraft in the old Presidential and Experimental hangars which are in a different location and require a separate trip to see. So, it is good for this plane to be in the main museum, but as you will see in the next photo, the walls are light absorbing black, and photography of an entire plane is now quite difficult as they are very close together. Scott.

Here is a much darker shot from the fuselage insignia looking forward. Scott.

Hi Scott. First off, welcome to the forum. I've heard about the museum and been planning to visit it for some years now, though I only live a couple hundred miles away.
I'm just wondering, does it have a sizeable number of exhibits? Does it span various eras of aviation, or just WWII? Finally, would a day suffice to see all of it and spend decent time with each item on display, or would multiple days be necessary? In other words, is it the scale of PIMA in AZ (huge), or smaller?
Thanks for your feedback.