ASN Wikibase Occurrence # 193244
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| Date: | Friday 2 February 1940 |
| Time: | 10:40 |
| Type: | Polikarpov I-153 |
| Owner/operator: | 38 IAP Soviet Air Force |
| Registration: | 6469 |
| MSN: | |
| Fatalities: | Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 1 |
| Aircraft damage: | Destroyed |
| Location: | between Bromarv and Pettu island -
 Finland
|
| Phase: | Combat |
| Nature: | Military |
| Departure airport: | |
The Finnish fighter unit LLv 26 had started the Winter War equipped with Bristol Bulldog IVAs. Plans to equip it with new Fiat G.50 fighters were delayed, as Germany did not allow transit permission for the aircraft. This is why LLv 26 was assigned Gladiator fighters as provisional equipment starting from 18 January 1940. On 2 February 1940, the Gladiators of LLv 26, that had recently arrived at the ice base at Littoinen near Turku after assembling in Sweden, fought its first battles and scored its first victories.
The fist successful pilot this day was luutnanti Paavo David Berg. Born in Lahti on 23 November 1911, he had received flying training in 1930-31 and was accepted to KadK on 2 June 1931. He was promoted to luutnanti on 16 May 1935 and posted to LLv 26 on 31 January 1938.
Berg scrambled from Littoinen in Gladiator II GL-263 as air raid sirens were screaming in Turku. At 1040 hrs a squadron of six I-153s bounced him from above over Hanko. His Gladiator received several hits, but a fast evasive turn prevented any further damage. Berg decided to test the manoeuvrability of his new mount and the nearest three-plane Chaika section wanted to fight with him. The rest of them went away.
According to Berg’s combat report, the Soviet fighters made a tight turn to try finishing him off again. He made a turn too and discovered that his Gladiator was able to turn with the Soviet biplanes. He was able to get into a firing position behind one of them, tightened his turn to the extreme and thus was able to pull enough deflection to hit his engine with a short burst.
The plane he fired on went down towards the ice and made a landing on the frozen sea. It looked only slightly damaged. His comrades decided to turn for home. Berg decided to fly back to Littoinen because he feared the hits on his own aircraft might be critical. He landed back safely at Littoinen and ran to luutnanti Jorma “Joppe” Karhunen, a flight commander in 1/LLv 24 whose Fokker D.XXIs wer also based at Littoinen.
Berg told him: "I shot down a Chaika, it crashed on the ice. My own aircraft has hits, can you borrow me a Fokker so I can go and have a look at the wreck?" As he was very exited about his first kill, he gave him my permission to use one of the Fokkers. Berg took off and returned after some time. Unfortunately he had damaged the Fokkers undercarriage making a harsh landing on the ice, so the Fokker had to be repaired at the state aircraft factory at Tampere overnight.
Berg’s victim was I-153 c/n 6469 from 38 IAP flown by Starshiy Leytenant Nikolai Iosifovitsh Bedarev (originally from 4./25 IAP), who was taken POW. He was captured between Bromarv and Pettu Island, so very probably landed on the ice in this area, north of Hanko.
38 IAP reported that they attacked Turku AF base. Kapitan V. P. Teplyakov claimed two Bulldogs in combat while Kapitan Sergeyev and Starshiy Leytenant Ivanov claimed three Bulldogs destroyed on the ground. The Finnish didn’t suffer any losses.
Sources:
http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/finland_berg.htm
http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/gladiator_finland.htm
http://surfcity.kund.dalnet.se/soviet_teplyakov.htm
http://www.arkisto.fi/uploads/Palvelut/Julkaisut/SOTAVANGIT%20JA%20INTERNOIDUT_WEB.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bromarf
https://www.geographic.org/geographic_names/name.php?uni=-1985658&fid=1756&c=finland
Revision history:
| Date/time | Contributor | Updates |
|---|---|---|
| 03-Feb-2017 09:42 | Laurent Rizzotti | Added |
| 02-Jul-2021 08:36 | JF | Updated [Operator, Location] |
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