Messerschmitt Me 210 and 410 Hornisse

The Me 210 and 410 served as fighter-bomber and reconnaissance aircraft from 1942 to 1945. Proposed to the German air ministry in late 1937 as a more powerful and more versatile successor of the Messerschmitt Bf 110, the Me 210 seemed on papar a very promising and extremely useful aircraft. A contract for 1,000 was placed before the first (with twin-fins) flew on 2 September 1939, but this was a huge mistake. The chief test pilot commented that the Me 210 had "all the least desirable attributes an aeroplane could possess." Though it looked good and reached 616km/h on two 1,395hp DB 601F engines and carried 1,000kg of bombs inside a bomb bay and had clever remote-control defensive guns at the rear, the 210 was so full of faults that its production was halted in April 1942. After complete, detailed redesign it emerged in 1943 as the Me 410 Hornisse (hornet) with speeds around 624km/h on two 1,750hp DB 603A engines. The 410 served as a bomber-interceptor with up to six heavy cannon, and often with a 50mm gun projecting far ahead of the nose, and sometimes with rocket launchers in the nose; bomber and reconnaissance versions also saw action, but this too was most unsuccessful and production stopped in 1944.

	Technical data and/or diagram of Messerschmitt Me 210 and Me 410.
	Schräge Musik - the lethal tactics of German nightfighters that brought down hundreds of British heavy bombers.
	A Me 410 parked on runway.
	The rotating rocket launchers in the bomb bay of a Me 410.
	A lateral view of a Me 410, notice the remote-control gun in the middle of the fuselage.
	A flying Me 410 high in the sky, the remote-control gun clearly visible.
	One of the few remaining Me 410 in an aviation museum.

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