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First Earthrounder: Friedrich Karl von Koenig-Warthausen - Method to the Madness?

Today I learned about Friedrich Karl von Koenig-Warthausen, who was the first person who flew around the earth in Aug 1928. I talked to someone who knew him personally, and he seems like he was quite an interesting character.

Some cliffnotes:

- started his first leg Berlin – Moscow after only 20h solo experience and 12h flight instruction. It was a nonstop flight lasting around 20h (but he had to land 50km short due to weather) and he took off at midnight
- flew a Klemm-Daimler L20 with 20 horsepower, 265kg empty weight and MTWO of 450kg, stall speed around 40km/h
- modified tank to hold 180 liters instead of 45 liters
- when he took off in Berlin his takeoff roll was 1km
- during PPL training at the time, death rate was about 50%. Mainly due to old trainer planes from 1st World War which were unreliable
- the instruments of his plane: RPM indicator, VSI, magnetic compass
- he said in a TV interview that he trimmed the plane nose-down. So when he would fall asleep the RPMs would climb and the different engine noise would wake him up. He said this saved his life “several times”
- in the same interview, he mentioned that the most dangerous moments were when he was climbing through overcast to then fly on top. And also descending through solid cloud layer. Apparently he used the sun for orientation, saying “I tried to stay upright by flying in a way so the brighter part of the cloud would be above me”
- he had only very rudimentary maps, I think he found his way to Moscow by using a map from his school book
- the plane was fabric over wood. He could only fly max 1.5h in the rain, then had to land due to fabric getting soaked.
- during his around the world trip he had 20 precautionary landings and emergency landings

So I have to tip my hat to this guy. If I had attempted something like this with his equipment and experience, I would have died for sure. Having a STOL airplane certainly helped, but I still would have died.

How could he accomplish this feat? I mean flying at night, IMC with basically no instruments, only bare-bones training when he left Berlin. Crazy!

Was he just lucky or is this actually doable with enough training or talent? Is IMC flight easier with an ultralight type of plane?

BTW: he was quite a celebrity due to this endeavor. Met many famous guys on the way, like kings, Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh, Hollywood celebs – cool guy :)

Switzerland

For those that wonder: according to Wikipedia, he crossed the oceans by ship, not in flight.

ELLX

HBadger wrote:

Was he just lucky or is this actually doable with enough training or talent?

It’s the thing about pioneers. They push the boundaries for what is possible by risking their lives. Doing the same thing today, and we call them reckless fools, nothing but a danger to themselves and others. There are some in modern times as well. Mathias Rust for instance. Fresh out of PPL, age 18, he flew to Island, then across Scandinavia to land on the red square in Moscow in the midst of the cold war.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Yes, he used the ship a few times.

The fact that he had basically an ultralight helped him numerous times. For example after a few precautionary landings, he just rounded up a few locals, detached the wings and they hand carried the plane to somewhere else.

Also with such a low stall speed and short landing distance he could land in many places.

But yes, he must have had a crazy risk tolerance.

Switzerland

Mathias Rust did not push any boundaries except perhaps those of sanity.

Biggin Hill

We are living in times where nonconformist actions of individuals are easily viewed as a danger for the community. Which is not what humanism teaches us. It’s a dangerous pathway.

Safe landings !
EDLN, Germany

Cobalt wrote:

Mathias Rust did not push any boundaries except perhaps those of sanity.

My point (well almost). No one “ordinary” will do anything out of the ordinary simply because they feel “they can”. In earlier times we had much more appreciation towards out of the ordinary stuff. We didn’t dismiss them as madness/danger/whatever as fast and as sure as we do today.

EuroFlyer wrote:

We are living in times where nonconformist actions of individuals are easily viewed as a danger for the community. Which is not what humanism teaches us. It’s a dangerous pathway.

Exactly.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

There may be other reasons too why people no longer get excited by “grand achievements”…

  • most people don’t admire technical achievements the way they did in decades past (the last being perhaps Apollo)
  • a lot of innovative/adventure stuff has already been done
  • a lot of places in the world are not particularly safe to travel to (for 1st World people) whereas in say the 1920s if you looked sufficiently crazy, you were ok
  • the early flying pioneers faced significant challenges with engine reliability, and navigation (these are largely gone, with good engines, GPS, satphones, ELTs, etc)
  • you always needed lots of money to do these adventures (hence the elaborate PR/sponsorship stunts we see nowadays, leading sometimes to the wheels coming off the whole thing) and nowadays the people who have the money spend it where they get more visibility or whatever

One could admire Rust for what he did, but equally he could have easily got himself shot. In fact the only reason he was not shot was because the chain of command in the USSR didn’t work as it should have done. Anybody could have done that flight, in a plane with enough range, and some rudimentary maps. It was always a one-way trip, after all Not many would admire Rust for his later adventures (do a google). A couple of related threads are here and here.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Peter wrote:

Anybody could have done that flight, in a plane with enough range, and some rudimentary maps

Yes, could have done, could with the hindsight information we now have about the state of the USSR at the time he did it. He was the only one doing it though, and one of the results was a head rolling in the Soviet armed forces like no one have seen since Stalin’s decimations. To believe you could survive, even a few NM into USSR airspace, requires a rather special state of mind. You also have to remember he was only 18 and with a fresh out of training PPL.

What he did was to prove the impossible to be possible for a whole world. The only reason no one else has done it, is because no one else would even dream of it being possible.

Peter wrote:

There may be other reasons too why people no longer get excited by “grand achievements”…

Very true, but I still think the main reason is our “patience” with nonconformist individuals is at an all time low. The pioneering spirit is not only gone, but is seen as a threat to us all, and as a symptom of madness even. Before it was seen as a bit too bald to be sound in the long run for that individual, but never as a general threat, and never as a sign of madness. Today it’s more important to come up with new ways to be “offended” while we live our ultra-conformist lives.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway
He was the only one doing it though,

Rust was the only one to make it to Moskow, but he was not the only aircraft fleeing into the East.

Yes, we do celebrate a time of over-ultra-conformism and boldly go where no man has gone before – to die on the coach.
But, there will be a time when bold people will have a renaissance and mankind takes its chance to survive – I hope.

Last Edited by at 26 Dec 07:35
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