Rocket Fighter

Book excerpt: BAPTISM OF FIRE: THE WORLDS FIRST ROCKET-POWERED JET FIGHTER. The Messerschmitt 163 was developed and tested by the Germans in absolute secrecy. As World War II drew to a close and Allied bomber formations swept across the German countryside, the Luftwaffe high command pinned its last desperate hopes on this deadly new flying machine. Although the plane came too late for Germany, it forever altered the face of war. Mano Ziegler, one of the few men to survive the Me 163’s initiation in battle, tells the story of the brave pilots pushed to the limits of physical endurance men who, bound by duty and driven by courage, experienced high-altitude velocities and air pressures no human body had ever before endured. He also tells the story of the plane itself, which screwed across the sky at unheard of speeds to usher in the age of supersonic flight and of supersonic fighters.-Print ed.