WOW314 Me. 163 Komet (Hartmut Ryll)

Description

The Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet was a German interceptor aircraft designed for point-defence and is the only rocket-powered fighter aircraft ever to have been operational and the first piloted aircraft of any type to exceed 1000 km/h (621 mph) in level flight. Designed by Alexander Lippisch, its performance and aspects of its design were unprecedented. German test pilot Heini Dittmar in early July 1944 reached 1,130 km/h (700 mph), an unofficial flight airspeed record unmatched by turbojet-powered aircraft for almost a decade.
This speedy pint-sized rocket interceptor proved dangerous to friend and foe alike and was prone to exploding on landing should any unexpended rocket fuel still be in the tank. The Komet could zoom almost untouched through a formation of high-flying bombers, firing its heavy cannons on each pass. However it’s speed was so fast it was often too difficult to focus and aim in time before the Komet had overflown its target.  
 
The sole Luftwaffe unit to become operational with the Me163 was Jagdgeschwader (Fighter Wing) 400. Tasked with protecting the vital Leuna oil refineries near Leipzig, Messerschmitt 163s from this unit first engaged Eighth US Army Air Force B17 Flying Fortresses on 16 August 1944. By the end of the war nine Allied aircraft had been shot down by JG 400.

WOW314 our first Komet is supplied in a traditional two tone green which was flown by Hartmut Ryll a rookie entry into the Luftwaffe.

Here is the US transcript of his action against them:
On August 16, Ryll so badly shot up a 305th Bomber Group B-17 that although it would struggle back to England, he was credited with a kill. Next he homed in on a lone Fortress of the 91st BG, but the escorting Mustang’s from the 359th’s flown by Lt. Col. John B. Murphy cut him off. “I opened fire from about 1,000 feet and held it until I overshot,” Murphy reported. “I scored a few hits on the left side of the fuselage.”
Wingman Lieutenant Cyril W. Jones Jr. got in a burst too; “The entire canopy seemed to dissolve on the enemy aircraft…the pilot was surely  killed.” As the Komet spiraled down, Murphy turned back inside it, “seeing continuous strikes the full length of the fuselage. Parts began falling off, followed by a big explosion and more parts falling off. I could smell a strange chemical fume in my cockpit as I followed through the smoke from the explosion.”
Ryll did not survive like so many young pilots of his era.

Limited to 5 of this 1/30 scale wooden model.