'The Night Reaper'

[Simpo Two]

Happened to catch a TV programme today about the Czech pilot Karel Kuttelwascher who flew his cannon-armed Hurricane 'The Night Reaper' to great success on night intruder missions over Europe.

I can find models of it but surprisingly no books. Anyone know of any?

Info here: www.rogerdarlington.me.uk/nighthawk.html

ETA: Ah, have just read further down and can get to http://www.amazon.co.uk/Night-Hawk-Kuttelwascher-D... Yipes, not cheap.

ETA2: OK that doesn't work, try http://tinyurl.com/24ypdjk

Edited by Simpo Two on Saturday 19th June 21:52

[aeropilot]

The BBMF Hurricane IIC PZ865 is currently painted to represent 'Kuts' wartime Hurricane BE581, JX-E.

[Simpo Two]

What surprised me most was that I'd never heard of him. Single-seat day fighters weren't particularly good at night, early attempts to intercept bombers over England being usually fruitless, no radar so relying on sight. Until now I thought the only useful intruder/nightfighter missions used Mosquitos or Beaufighters.

Karel seemed a remarkable lone wolf; a pity that more couldn't emulate him.

[aeropilot]

Simpo Two said:

What surprised me most was that I'd never heard of him. Single-seat day fighters weren't particularly good at night, early attempts to intercept bombers over England being usually fruitless, no radar so relying on sight. Until now I thought the only useful intruder/nightfighter missions used Mosquitos or Beaufighters.

Karel seemed a remarkable lone wolf; a pity that more couldn't emulate him.

It was making model kits 35+ years ago as a child/teen that I first heard of him, as IIRC, the Frog 1/72 Hurricane IIC was in 'Kuts' JX-E markings.

The Hurricane squadrons operating cross-channel night-intruder were very successful. The book on the Hurricane by Francis K Mason has a chapter on these ops.

[Eric Mc]

Yep - the old FROG Hurricane was in the markings of Kuttlewascher. My brother built the model around 1971/72.

It just shows how eductational model building could be. I learned an awful lot about WW1 and WW2 purely from building plastic kits.