09/03/2025
Focke Wulf 190 D-13 Deep Dive:
Our incredibly rare Fw 190 D-13 was flown by Major Franz Götz, commander of Jagdgeschwader 26 (JG 26). Flying most of his career with the JG 53, he had the Ace of Spades insignia from his old unit painted on the plane. The word “Kommodore” is also inscribed under the radiator. By war’s end, Götz had claimed 63 victories, and he personally delivered this Dora to an RAF base after Germany’s surrender.
The aircraft was stripped of its German markings and tested against British Tempests before being loaded aboard HMS Reaper with other advanced Luftwaffe aircraft (including our Me 262) as part of Operation L***y, the program that sought to deliver axis aircraft to the U.S. for evaluation.
But its story nearly ended in 1945. Scheduled for static display at an airshow, its wings were mistakenly swapped with those of a D-9. Afterward, the Army Air Corps deemed piston fighters obsolete and scheduled it for scrap. Luckily, they offered the aircraft to Georgia Tech, where the staff discovered its 20mm cannon was still loaded and that its critical “Kommandogerät” engine control unit was missing.
Over the next decades, the plane passed through several owners, sometimes treated more like junk than history. The wing mix-up wasn’t fixed until restoration began in 2001, when the Dora finally regained its proper wings after nearly 60 years. Completed in 2004, it appeared at Seattle’s Museum of Flight before joining the Flying Heritage & Combat Armor Museum in 2007, proudly displayed on opening day in 2008.
Today, it remains the only surviving Focke Wulf 190 D-13 in the world.
