On August 10, 1938, Focke-Wulf Fw 200 S-1 Condor, D-ACON, captained by Deutsche Luft Hansa Kapitän Alfred Henke, embarked on a historic transatlantic flight from Flugplatz Berlin-Staaken. The Brandenburg-named aircraft took off on this flight at 7:30 p.m. Its crew included Hauptmann Rudolf Freiherr von Moreau of the Luftwaffe as co-pilot, Paul Dierberg as flight engineer, and Walter Kober as radio operator. Notably, there were no passengers on board.
The Condor followed a Great Circle course over the North Atlantic to a landing at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York, at 1:50 p.m. local time on August 11. The distance of 6,371 kilometers (3,958 miles) was flown in 24 hours, 56 minutes, and 12 seconds, at an average speed of 255 kilometers per hour (158 miles per hour). The flight was uneventful except for bad weather. Once on the ground after landing, the ground crew determined and corrected a small amount of damage to an engine cowling and engine lubricating oil tube.
Following a brief and unexplained flight to Washington, D.C. by Hauptmann von Moreau, Brandenburg was ready for its homeward flight over the Atlantic to Germany. Taking off from Floyd Bennett Field well before 9:30 a.m. on August 13, the aircraft flew to Flughafen Berlin-Templehof in 19 hours and 56 minutes, against a distance of 6,392 kilometers (3,972 miles), at an average speed of 321 kilometers per hour (199 miles per hour), with the help of favorable winds.
Returning home, Captain Henke and Hauptmann von Moreau received a personal congratulation from Adolf Hitler. Henke was an Oberleutnant in the Luftwaffe too and with the marked dueling scar on his face easily recognizable.
Fw 200 V1, prototype Condor, first flew on July 27, 1937, from Neulander Feld, Bremen with test pilot Kurt Waldemar Tank, the aircraft’s designer at the controls. Tank had envisioned the Condor as a long-range commercial transport for routes from Europe to South America. Unlike the heavy and aerodynamically inefficient flying boats used by British and American airlines, the streamlined land plane design of the Condor promised greater speed and passenger capacity.
The all-metal, low-wing monoplane Fw 200 V1 was powered by four radial Pratt & Whitney Hornet S1E-G engines, which were soon replaced by BMW 132 Ls. It had a retractable landing gear and was designed to carry as many as 26 passengers. The length was 78 feet, with a wingspan of 108 feet, while its height was 20 feet. The airliner had an empty weight of 24,030 pounds and a gross weight of 37,479 pounds, which, with modifications, increased to 39,683 pounds.
Maximum speed at sea level was 233 miles per hour, with a cruising speed of 205 miles per hour at 10,000 feet. The service ceiling was at 20,000 feet and it could maintain level flight at 13,000 feet with three engines and at 10,000 feet with two. For the Berlin-to-New York flight, its fuel capacity was increased to 2,400 gallons.
D-ACON demonstrated its reach with a series of significant flights. On November 20, 1938, Brandenburg was flying from Berlin to Hanoi, setting an FAI World Record for Speed Over Courses at 243 kilometers per hour. Unfortunately, on December 6, 1938, the Condor ditched into Manila Bay due to fuel starvation; the aircraft was not repairable.
Although originally developed for civilian service on airliners, the Focke-Wulf Fw 200 soon found military service as a long-range maritime patrol bomber. Condors built both for bombing and transport duties played an important part in attempts by the Axis powers to sever the Allied sea lanes crossing the Atlantic Ocean after hostilities broke out in World War II.