The Complete Book of Spaceflight: From Apollo 1 to Zero Gravity

Aseries of Vergeltungswaffen—“vengeance weapons”—designed
and built in Nazi Germany for
use against allied countries in World War II. The only
ones to be significantly deployed were the V-1 and
V-2. The latter was extraordinarily influential in the
years leading up to the Space Age.
V-1
The infamous German flying bomb, known colloquially
as the “doodlebug” or “buzz bomb,” and officially
as the Fieseler FZG-76; it was the world’s first operational
cruise missile. Carrying a 900-kg warhead, the
V-1 was launched from an inclined ramp using a steam
catapult and powered by a pulse-jet engine, firing at
40 times a second, that propelled it to speeds of over
580 km/hr and a range of over 320 km. Far from
being the simple device it appeared to be, the V-1 was
equipped with magnetic compass, autopilot, and
range-setting and flight controls. Of the 10,492 flying
bombs launched, 2,419 hit London. In July 1944, less
than three weeks after the first V-1s struck England,
American engineers began a remarkable effort to
reverse-engineer their own version of the buzz bomb.
A working copy of the V-1, built largely from damaged
components salvaged from English crash sites, was
fired at Wright Field. Further tests of the missile took
place at Muroc Army Air Base, and contracts were let
for the production of 2,000 weapons, designated JB-2
( Jet Bomb-2) and nicknamed the Loon. After World
War II, the JB-2 played a significant role in the development
of other surface-to-surface missile systems—in
particular, the Matador, Snark, and Navaho. 162
V-2
A 13-ton guided missile that carried a one-ton explosive
charge. The liquid-fueled V-2 was the first large
military rocket and the immediate ancestor of the
launch vehicles used at the dawn of the Space Age. It
was guided by an advanced gyroscopic system that
sent radio signals to aerodynamic steering tabs on the
fins and vanes in the exhaust. Its propellants—alcohol
(a mixture of 75% ethanol and 25% water) and liquid
oxygen—were delivered to the thrust chamber by two
rotary pumps, driven by a steam turbine.
“V” weapons
The V-2, or A-4 as it was initially known, was the ultimate
development of the “A” series of German rockets.
The first static tests of its engine took place in 1940,
followed on October 3, 1942, by the first successful
launch of the missile itself. Later that evening at dinner,
Walter Dornberger said: “We have invaded space with
our rocket and for the first time—mark this well—have
used space as a bridge between two points on the
Earth.... This third day of October 1942 is the first of
a new era of transportation—that of space travel.”
In the wake of an RAF raid on Peenemünde on
August 17, 1943, V-2 production was taken away from
Dornberger and moved to a massive network of
underground tunnels near Nordhausen, an SS facility
called the Mittelwerk. Disagreement arose over how
to deploy the missile. Some wanted the rocket
launched from hardened bunkers along the coast of
France; others thought a mobile launching system
would be best. In the end, both methods were tried.
Massive concrete emplacements were started in
France but never completed because of continual
Allied bombing attacks. The Peenemünde engineers
had developed a mobile transporter and erector for
the V-2, known as the Meillerwagon. Along with rail
transportation, it became the standard method of
transportation and launch.
On Friday evening, September 8, 1944, the first
V-2s were fired in earnest, one of them creating a huge
explosion and crater in Staveley Road, west London.
After the explosion came a double thunderclap
caused by the sonic boom catching up with the fallen
rocket. Over the next seven months, about 2,500 V-2s
were launched, 517 of them striking London and hundreds
more exploding in counties around the capital
and Allied-held parts of France, Belgium, and Holland.
By April 1945, the German rocket batteries were
Length: 14 m
Diameter (max.): 1.65 m
Launch mass: 13,000 kg
Thrust at liftoff: 245,000 N
Burn time: 65 sec
Maximum speed: 5,750 km/hr
Maximum altitude: 96 km
Range: 320 km
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