Leica photo reconnaissance - from a Starfighter single seater

[Christoph13]

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I had never seen or hear about it before. During the Cold War era Norwegian F-104 jet pilots intercepted Russian bombers and other aircraft and collected all kind of military intelligence about types, armament, antennae etc. I had seen declassified photos of those like you probably all have but never asked myself how they were done. 

 

At least some of them were routinely taken using a Leica M with a 135mm lens, first as an experiment using the private camera of one of the pilots, later the whole squadron was equipped with these. I have never flown a Starfighter myself but this type had a reputation of being terribly temperamental to say the least. Flying these planes must have been a handful already, but intercepting and chasing uncooperative planes, sometimes at night or through clouds and taking handheld pictures from inside this cramped cockpit, setting aperture and shutter speed? With gloves on?

There is a documentary on Youtube with some of the Norwegian pilots talking about just that (jump to minute 03:21 of the video if you are only interested in the Leica). 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0IglJ3Z2ak

 

I am speechless. 

[wattsy]

Very interesting. The F-104 has long been one of my favourite aircraft.

[M9reno]

Funny - at 4:05 into the clip they speak about having to train the pilots to learn to shoot a Leica M3, with manual speeds and aperture...

 

... and make it sound almost as hard as flying an F-104!

[pico]

Very interesting. The F-104 has long been one of my favourite aircraft.

 

When I was stationed at an RAF base, all emergency resources were scrambled when a F-104 was to land. They were all German purchases. Fortunately, none crashed on our flight line when I was there. They were super scary aircraft and our German allies lost very many during those years. I think the count was 60 during my tour

[spydrxx]

I remember during the cold war the F4 fighter pilots aboard my first carrier discussing whether they should be using Leicas instead of the Topcons they were using for recon. As I was in the market for a new camera I looked into both as well as their recon photos of other aircraft and ships and went for the Leica (M4). Never regretted my choice.

[Chuck Albertson]

Interesting clip. I didn't know the Russians have an AWACS version of the Bear. Can't imagine flying the F-104 and trying to operate the M3 at the same time, especially wearing gloves. And framing with the tiny 135 frame lines wouldn't have been a snap, either. When I lived in Phoenix in the 1960s, the Luftwaffe had a training squadron of F-104s, and they had a lot of accidents, including several fatalities.