Goss, Chris Dornier Do 217

From Bomber to Night Fighter

The Dornier Do 217 entered service in early 1941 and was designed as an improved version of the flying pencil, the Do 17 bomber. The twin-engine Do 217E-1 bomber with radial engines flew for the first time in October 1940, the same month that production of the Do 17 was discontinued. The Do 217 was initially used for conventional bombing raids and anti-ship missions around Great Britain, including the infamous Baedeker Blitz against British provincial towns in 1942. The Do 217 was the most important German bomber in this theatre of operations until the end of 1943, before being replaced by the Messerschmitt Me 410 and the Junkers Ju 188. During this time, the Do 217E was improved, leading to the introduction of the Do 217K or M, which differed in their engines. The Do 217 was used in all campaigns and on all fronts of the Luftwaffe during the Second World War. Interestingly, however, the only operational units that used this type on the Eastern Front were the night reconnaissance units; apart from that, only other Do 217 units occasionally flew missions against Stalin's troops. Due to the delay in the commissioning of the Heinkel He 177, the Do 217 was the first aircraft in history to be used in combat with precision-guided weapons. This happened on 21 July 1943, when Do 217s of KG 100 attacked Allied ships in the port of Augusta, Sicily, with radio-guided Fritz X glide bombs. On 25 August 1943, twelve Do 217E-5s of II./KG 100 attacked a convoy off the Spanish coast with a weapon similar to the Fritz X, the radio-controlled gliding bomb Henschel Hs 293. Three warships were damaged in this attack. In response to the intensifying strategic bomber offensive by the Allies, the Luftwaffe needed additional night fighters. The Do 217E-2 was therefore converted and equipped with four MG17 and four MG-FF 20 mm cannons in a massive nose. The rear armament, including the MG131 in the turret, was retained, as was the ability to carry bombs, resulting in the Do 217J-1, which was intended as a night fighter. The Do 217 was also used extensively as a night fighter, with some examples equipped with Lichtenstein radar and upward-angled MG151 cannons in the fuselage, the so-called Schräge Musik (slanted music) modification. Despite the versatility and wide range of applications of the Do 217 which the author demonstrates here with a remarkable collection of archive images, many of which have never been published before production was discontinued in October 1943. By the following year, the Do 217 was already obsolete.