During the early 1990s, two scuba divers, Leslie Storace and John Zammit, were exploring the reef called is-Sikka l-Bajda when they came across bits and pieces of old wreckage. Is-Sikka l-Bajda, which is situated some three kilometres off the northeastern tip of the Aħrax peninsula, varies greatly in depth. At some points, the seabed is just 15 metres below the surface, but the rocky and sandy bottom then plummets to 70 metres.

From what the two divers could determine, the remains they found came from a wartime aircraft, so they informed the Malta War Museum Association of their find. Storace, who was an employee of Tug Malta Ltd, even offered to talk to his superiors to try and make available one of the company’s tugboats, so that any important remains could be brought to the surface. The War Museum Association members asked the two divers if they could take photographs of the wreckage in situ, so they could try to determine what type of aircraft lay on the bottom.

Storace and Zammit did better than that; they filmed the aircraft remains on the reef. The footage showed an engine lying on the rocky seabed, aluminium parts scattered all around it, and what seemed to be an undercarriage leg emerging from a sandy patch.

After obtaining the relevant permissions, the two divers also brought to the surface part of the airframe. When this was cleaned from years of incrustations and sea growth, an inscription in German appeared. The fact that there was a single engine on the crash site left only two possibilities: the aircraft was either a Messerschmidt Bf 109 fighter or a Junkers Ju 87 bomber.

A Junkers Ju 87 flying over the Maltese islands. Photo: Battlefront Living History Group Facebook page

In the meantime, Storace’s principals had agreed to allow one of their tugboats to be used so pieces of the aircraft could be salvaged. It was decided that the most significant part of the wreckage was the engine, and an attempt was to be made to bring it to the surface so it could be displayed at the War Museum.

Despite force 5 winds and a choppy sea, on September 11, 1993, divers from the Museums Department and the Malta War Museum Association successfully marked the engine with a buoy and, the following day, all was set to attempt to lift the engine from where it had lain for at least 50 years.

Tugboat Ċetta arrived early in the morning near the marker buoy. Again, divers went to the bottom, this time equipped with a one-ton lifting bag, which they tied to the engine. The lifting bag was filled with air until it ballooned, and slowly but surely, it pulled the engine to the surface.

A hydraulic crane from Ċetta then hoisted it on to its deck. Despite being covered with decades of marine growth, for the expert eyes of the aviation historians, the engine was immediately recognisable as a Jumo 211 from a Junkers Ju 87D. Interestingly enough, a steel wire was found attached to the engine; someone had made a previous attempt to recover it, but the wire had snapped. The Jumo 211 was badly damaged on its front end. The engine block and cylinder heads were cracked, suggesting a heavy vertical impact with the sea.

The engine was taken to Malta Drydocks, where it was grid-blasted for free. Meanwhile, Tug Malta Ltd manufactured a display stand and the engine was eventually exhibited on it at the War Museum, where it can be admired to this day.

A comrade of Westphalen who witnessed the crash thought that the Junkers, or Obermailänder himself, had been hit by anti-aircraft or ground machine-gun fire

The grave of Feldwebel Obermeiländer and Unteroffizier Westphalen at Cagliari, Sardinia. Photo: Findagrave.com

But how did this Luftwaffe bomber end up on is-Sikka l-Bajda? On May 8, 1942, at 8.37am, six Junkers Ju 88s and 15 Junkers Ju 87s bombed Ta’ Qali, Ħal Far and Ħal Safi airfields. After the attack, one of the Junkers Ju 87s, piloted by 22-year-old Feldwebel Walter Obermailänder, with 19-year-old Unteruffizier Albert Westphalen as his navigator/radio operator, never regained height but kept flying at 100 metres. Then, without warning, the aircraft suddenly tipped downwards and plunged in the sea off Aħrax. A comrade of Westphalen who witnessed the crash thought that the Junkers, or Obermailänder himself, had been hit by anti-aircraft or ground machine-gun fire.

The corpses of the two German airmen were eventually recovered from the sea and now rest peacefully at the San Michele Communal Cemetery in Sardinia. It is probable that upon their recovery, they were buried at Pembroke Cemetery. Then, during the 1960s, all Axis servicemen interred there were exhumed and taken to Italy.

Unfortunately, what remains of the Junkers Ju 87 on is-Sikka l-Bajda is slowly being destroyed by the corrosive action of the sea. To make matters worse, ships bunkering on the reef drag their anchors, destroying everything in their path. Luckily, thanks to the efforts of diving enthusiast Raniero Borg, this practice was recently stopped and the ships now anchor in deeper waters.

Over 6,000 Junkers Ju 87s were produced. These saw action over Europe, North Africa and the Eastern Front. Photo: www.asisbiz.com

The Junkers Ju 87 is most commonly known as the Stuka, which is derived from the German word sturzkampfflugzeug, meaning dive-bomber. The pilot had a window in the cockpit floor and when he spotted the target through it, he moved the dive lever to the rear and reduced the throttle. The dive-brakes then activated automatically, and the aircraft rolled 180 degrees, nosing into a dive at a 60˚ to 90˚angle. When the pilot released the bombs, an automatic control mechanism took over, pulling the Stuka out of its dive.

At this moment, the crew experienced 6G forces and sometimes lost vision or greyed-out for a few seconds as the blood rushed to the lower parts of their bodies. When the centrifugal forces lost their effect, the pilot again took control of the aircraft. This dive-bombing procedure meant that the Stuka could drop its bombs with great precision.

At the beginning of the war, the Ju 87 was also equipped with sirens, which were attached either to the wings or to the undercarriage. These were also known as Jericho’s trumpets, due to the Biblical account of the siege of the city of Jericho, when the sounding of horns by Jewish priests heralded the destruction of the city walls. When the bomber dived, the sirens started wailing in the airflow. Their aim was to lower morale and terrify those on the receiving end of the attack.

Whistles attached to the fins of bombs. Photo: https://ww2aircraft.net

During the Battle of France in 1940, a British private described being bombed by Ju 87s: “Stukas had, we didn’t know at that time, special sirens attached which made this hellish scream… I threw myself down on the bank, spreadeagled, and I shook just like jelly. The noise was so penetrating and so ominous: it was devilish. Our sergeant major came round and said: ‘That effect is exactly what the enemy wants! The noise is there to get you like this! The noise won’t hurt you! Now pull yourself together!’ And we thought what blasted fools we were to be taken in like that… but honestly, it was the most devilish noise.”

But since the sirens had a propellor of 70 centimetres diameter, they reduced the aircraft speed by 20 to 25km/h through drag and were eventually phased out. It was realised that the same psychological effect could be produced by attaching whistles to the fins of some of the bombs.

Diagram of a Junkers Ju 87 showing the machine guns and sirens. Photo: Wikipedia

The Stuka was very slow, with a maximum speed of 335km/h. Once in the gunsight of Allied fighters, the bomber was very vulnerable, having only one 7.92mm machine gun to protect its rear, and two fixed machine guns in the wings firing forwards.

Many pilots also preferred not to engage the automatic pull-out mechanism after a dive, since enemy fighter pilots soon realised that the German bomber was practically flying itself for a few seconds and could not take evasive action if attacked.

Despite all these deficiencies, more than 6,000 Junkers Ju 87s were produced in five main variants, including the G model. This had two 37mm cannon and was used widely on the Eastern Front as a ‘tank-busting’ ground attack aircraft, giving a new lease of life to an aircraft which had become practically obsolete by 1941.

Author’s note

More information about the crash and recovery of this aircraft can be found in Air Battle of Malta by Anthony Rogers, in the article ‘Recovery of Jumo 211’ published on The National War Museum Association Newsletter October/December 1993, and on Facebook.

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Raniero Borg and Anthony Rogers, without whose assistance this article would not have been possible.

The soldier’s account of being under attack by a Junkers Ju 87 was taken from the book Forgotten Voices of Dunkirk, by Joshua Levine.