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Great Daring Moments From History

Khalid Elhassan September 28, 2020 31 min

Josip Broz Tito - World War II — Yugoslav partisans wading across a river. Wikimedia

28. A Daring Flight

Upon reaching Allied territory, ground troops opened fire on Carr’s FW190. To avoid friendly fire, he flew just above treetop at 350 mph. After flying about 200 miles, he reached his airfield. Unable to deploy the landing gear, or communicate via radio, Carr made a belly landing before his daring escape was ruined by his own airfield’s defenses blasting him out of the sky.

Military police surrounded the crashed FW190, and refused to accept Carr’s word that he was an American airman. It was finally sorted out when the group commander arrived, and identified his missing pilot. Carr is the only Allied pilot to fly off on a mission in a P-51, and return to base in an Fw190.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.