Search the Community

In 1938 Norway and Sweden purchased 12 He-115's each, for delivery that summer of '39. Sweden received their dozen before the war broke out (the received the swedish type designation T2, Torpedobomber 2), but Norway only received it's first 6 planes before the export license of the last 6 were withdrawn by Luftwaffe. They represented however a valuable addition to Norway's obsolete navy air force for the short, hectic months after the german invasion of Norway. Finally the boys felt they had a plane that could make a matter against the geman invaders. But only six planes streched over that vast coastline of Norway plus relatively unexperienced crews, made the odds fighting the huge, modern Luftwaffe a hopeless fight. In the end a handful of the Heinkels escaped the german forces after norway's defeat in june 1940. One went to Finland and were taken into service there immedately. The rest of the survivors fled to Britain. One of them was even a catured former Luftwaffe plane, which had emergency landed due to fuel shortage and captured by norwegian forces and flown to safety. After they entered UK the planes were rebuilt and fitted to RAF standard, getting british equipment, four fixed forward firing Brownings were mounted in the wings, a bead sight were mounted on the nose, for pilot's aiming. The long greenhouse glazing were covered with plating, plus a number of other changes were added. At least one was broken up not long after it arrived. The crew's probably went on to Canada where the new norwegian airforce academy, Little Norway, was established in Toronto At least one of the Heinkels saw a short carreer as agent ops plane in the Mediterranean, based on Malta. When in operation, the plane(s) were probably unmarked, painted in a flat black paint. They were operated by free french airforce crews, flying for RAF, under it's huge umbrella of airforces. Parts of one plane were discovered by maltese fishermen some years ago and is now displayed in the war museum in Valetta, It's original norwegian id code (F.52) is visible on some of the parts. My interpretation shows one of the Heinkels on the step, at the moment just before taking off from the Solent, during the testing period. https://flic.kr/p/VtjYxw