THAT HELICOPTER IN "WHERE EAGLES DARE"......

[Quasimodem]

(an early Clint Eastwood/Richard Burton flick).....really bugs me. I maintain that there *were* no helicopters used during WWII. Am I wrong?

Thanks
Q

[wring]

I don't recall a helicopter in that flick? Let's see, they parachuted in to Germany, hiked up the mountain, rode the cable car down the mountain, hopped in a bus, then onto a plane, nope, don't recall a copter.

OTOH. What really bugged me about that one was , here you had Burton, Eastwood, "Mary" and the one guy they rescued, holding at bay an entire (well, I don't know the term for it company? brigade? shrug - a whole lotta soldiers), Eastwood - not a scratch, "Mary" didn't even loose her eyeliner when she jumped in the river, the guy they rescued? not a bruise. Burton? got hit by one bullet that grazed his hand and he manfully wrapped a handkerchief around it and went on to jump on the cable car.

[Quasimodem]

Originally posted by wring
I don't recall a helicopter in that flick? Let's see, they parachuted in to Germany, hiked up the mountain, rode the cable car down the mountain, hopped in a bus, then onto a plane, nope, don't recall a copter.



It was toward the end of the movie and it was under a tarpaulin, remember?

Q

[wring]

I remember, they came off the mountain, rode the school bus, shooting half the German army in the process, drove said school bus into an airport, where they timed it perfectly to get picked up by the allied plane that had just landed. Who was trying to get into a copter?

[Quasimodem]

Sorry, wring: I *may* be mis-remembering the flick, but I could have sworn it was WHERE EAGLES DARE and they were gonna use the helicopter to escape the castle. I will now add an embarrassed smiley to show that if I made a mistake I am sorry to have wasted your time and the bandwith.
:o

Q

[Johnny L.A.]

The helicopter was a Bell 47. It was the first helicopter to receive certification in the United States and, as can be guessed by the designation, appeared in 1947.

There were helicopters in WWII. One of the first was demonstrated indoors (either at the Olympics or at a Party rally) by Hanna Reich. It had two rotors on outriggers. There was a propellor in front; but that was used to cool the engine, not for propulsion. If it was demonstrated at the Olympics, it was in 1936. If at a Party rally, then it may have been 1938. Sorry, I don't feel like researching it at the moment. But you can look up Hanna Reich. (Or Reisch.) The Germans also had a helicopter called, IIRC, the "Kricket". This one had two rotors that meshed above the cockpit. There were powered models and towed models, and they were used in a limited fashion for Naval observation.

The U.S. also used a helicopter in WWII. This was the Sikorski R-4. It was used in a rescue mission to retrieve an injured pilot (I believe) in the Pacific Theatre. It wasn't an easy mission. Ground forces had to make their way to the injured person, and then hack a landing zone out of the jungle. IIRC, the operation took about a month. I don't remember the year this occured.

The wartime helicopters were very underpowered. They were also quite rare when Where Eagles Dare was made. The Bell 47 was "kind of" contemporary with the action (only a few years after the movie was set) and it was reliable (many are still in regular use) and powerful enough to carry the passengers for the movie. And there were helicopters around. They were just very few and far between. Many war films used U.S. aircraft and armor since originals were so hard to obtain. The confusing thing about this film is that very few people know that there were helicpters in the time period depicted.

[Quasimodem]

I LOVE this place! Thank you very much for your reply! Very informative, even without the research.
:D

Q

[Jackmannii]

An impossible helicopter appearance would have been right in keeping with that movie.

What struck me as the most ludicrous part was the decision by Burton et al to risk bringing along the traitorous British spies as they were escaping. "Don't make a sound fellas as we sneak out of this fortress, we'll shoot you if you do, whereas if we all make it back to England you'll be hung." "OK, we'll be weally weally quiet."

[Johnny L.A.]

Here's a page with a photo of the Focke-Wulf FW-61 that Hanna Reich flew in 1938. http://www.geocities.com/avionesymujeres/autogiroaleman.htm

This site http://www.helis.com/default/ has a movie of it flying. Click on the "Pioneers" link on the left side of the page. The FW-61 is about half way down under "1936". The link to the footage is there.

I was wrong about the other German helicopter being the "Kricket". It was actually the Flettner Fl-282 "Kolibri" ("Hummingbird"). Here's what this site http://www.rotorhead.org/flightline/airframe.htm has to say about it:
Fl-282 Kolibri (Hummingbird) Design finalized in 1940. The first real helicopter production program. This was one of two types of German helicopters to reach squadron service in WWII. This version depicts the second prototype.

This bird's development program pre-dated Sikorsky's R-4 by almost 3 years! Used by the Army to spot artillery and guide tanks, and by the Navy to locate submarines.
The painting with the quote is very small and doesn't show any detail. Here's a better picture: http://www.helis.com/Pioneers/h_fl282f.shtml

Here's a page with photos of the Bell 47. You might remember them from M*A*S*H. http://www.hyperscale.com/reference/bell47gmcd_1.htm

[Johnny L.A.]

Oh, and as for the helicopter appearing in the film, I remember it landing in the courtyard of the castle. A VIP got out, but I don't remember who it was. It's been a while since I've seen the film.

[dietrologia]

I'm currently reading Inside the Third Reich by Albert Speer. On a footnote on page 537 of the paperback version, Speer writes of Karl Hanke's escape from Breslau:

A few month's later he waged the battle of Breslau without regard for human lives or historic buildings and even had his old friend the mayor, Dr. Spielhagen, publicly hanged. Then, as I heard from the designer Flettner, shortly before the surrender of Breslau he flew out of the besieged city in one of the few existing prototype helicopters.

This occured in early 1945.