Markiakerke Aerdrome

[Patrick]

Does anyone have a picture they can post or send to me of the German naval aerodrome at Markiakerke, near Ostende? Was this field located at or near the site of the present-day airport at Mariakerke (Ostend-Bruges)?

[Regulus]

Patrick,

It was just on the other side of the express road next to the airport, towards Ostend (Oostende)

I have a number of photo's from the airfield, are you looking for anything specific ?

[Patrick]

Hi Regulus, I'm interested in the the flight made by Walther Ilges and Paul Brandt on November 28,1916. They flew an LVG C.IV from Markiakerke (or Mariakerke?) near Oostende to London, dropped six bombs and took photographs. The references that I have on this flight are few and not very detailed. I'm interested in this since it's the subject of a 3D modeling project that I've been working on for over a year.

Regarding photos, I'd like to get a sense of what the aerodrome looked like -- the field, tree lines, roads, and buildings. Especially the hangars -- I'm picturing these as being wooden sheds rather than tents (because of the damp climate) but I could easily be wrong on this. It would be very helpful if I could see a rough sketch of the aerodrome's layout. I have Mike O'Connor's book Airfields & Airmen of the Channel Coast, but he barely mentions either Oostende or Mar(k)iakerke.

Some other questions that I'm thinking about --

1. In Data File 112, Peter Grosz states that the LVG C.IV was numbered 262/16, while Cole & Cheesman give it as 272/16 in their book The Air Defence Of Britain 1914-1918. Does a record survive about the LVG C.IVs used by II Marine Feld-Fliegerabteilung? (I think that's Ilges' & Brandt's unit). If you have a picture of any LVG flown by II MFA, I'd be very interested in seeing it.

2. About a year ago, Terry Phillips and I had a discussion here about whether Carbonit or the later P.u.W bombs were used.

http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/ai...-question.html

The conclusion I came to was that they used six 10 kg Carbonits, hung vertically from the fuselage in the manner used by the MFAs when carrying bombs for anti-shipping patrols. Any thoughts about this?

3. Did the MFAs specify paint finishes for their equipment or did they leave their planes in factory finish? The early LVG C.IVs were delivered either white, light blue or possibly CDL. Later, the factory finish was a two-tone camo (probably brown and green) with light blue undersides. The LVG C.IV flown by Ilges & Brandt would have been from the last production batch and likely would have been finished in camo. But it seems like a lot of the MFA planes were finished in what looks like light blue overall. In the absence of any definitive evidence, I lean towards light blue for my project just because the land camo finish looks odd on a plane that flew long distances over water.

Any information you can provide on this obscure topic is deeply appreciated!

[Regulus]

Patrick,

The Ilges and Brandt flight did not take place from Mariakerke, as the aerodrome was already abandoned by the Marine Feldflieger by the time.

I'll check - tomorrow - my material on the flight and see what I can come up with.

[Patrick]

Originally Posted by Regulus

Patrick,

The Ilges and Brandt flight did not take place from Mariakerke, as the aerodrome was already abandoned by the Marine Feldflieger by the time.

I'll check - tomorrow - my material on the flight and see what I can come up with.

It will be very interesting if you can determine where the flight actually began; you already confirm what I suspected, which is that the existing references are all repeating a story that was never thoroughly fact-checked. Thanks for taking time to look into this!

[CNOCK]

Hi,

Ilges and Brandt took off from Gistel.

Regards,

Cnock