“The fire was spreading, the plane was plummeting, and he was suddenly forced to choose between the burning flames and the dark void. The airman did a backflip out of the rear of the plane.”

Even The United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force Museum couldn’t believe it. They thought the story of Flight Sgt. Nicholas Alkemade’s miraculous landing was an urban legend, one of many people might encounter while serving in the military. There’s the story of the “Etherbunny” or the one about the saltpeter used to keep new recruits’ sexual urges in check. And then there’s the story about the man whose bomber was shot down, who fell 18,000 feet without a parachute and survived.

Except Alkemade’s story is so well-documented, we even know the name of the German fighter pilot who shot down his plane. What it really came down to aboard his Avro Lancaster bomber on the night of March 25, 1944, was how Sgt. Alkemade wanted to die. He could either be roasted to death aboard the flaming fuselage or take his chances in the cold, open air some 18,000 feet above the enemy-controlled Ruhr Valley. 

He jumped. 

Invincible Airman

Nicholas Stephen Alkemade was 21 years old in March 1944. He was a rear gunner aboard the Lancaster MkII bomber with No. 115 Squadron out of RAF Witchford in Cambridgeshire. In order to bring the Nazi war machine to its knees, the Allies in Europe were conducting round-the-clock bombing missions at the time. The Americans would conduct daring daytime bombing runs while the British would stealthily hit targets at night. On the evening of March 24, Alkemade and his fellow crewmembers of a bomber nicknamed “Werewolf” were to take part in a raid on Berlin with 811 other planes.  

The attack on Berlin went off exactly as planned. The RAF’s bombers flew over their respective targets and began to head home. But that’s where the mission began to go south. Literally and figuratively. Strong winds from the north forced the formation much further south on their return trip, which took them over Germany’s Ruhr Valley. At the time, the Ruhr was the center of Germany’s heavy industry, which produced coke, steel, weapons, and synthetic oil, among other products. Because it was home to so many critical factories and industrial plants, the area was heavily defended against incoming aircraft, so when the British bombers approached the area, its defenses lit up the night sky. 

Stay in the Fight!

Among those defenses were German fighter planes, which could still be a threat to bomber formations, even that late in the war. Junkers Ju-88 multirole night fighters made a beeline for the formation. Oberleutnant Heinz Rökker, flying a Ju-88, attacked the Werewolf from below, strafing its wing and fuselage and causing a fire that would eventually bring it plummeting back to Earth. Flight Sgt. Nicholas Alkemade, in his position in the rear turret, avoided being filled with bullet holes, but the glass protecting the turret was completely shattered. 

Alkemade kept fighting despite being exposed to the night air, returning fire to the oncoming Junkers. It wasn’t long before Werewolf’s pilot ordered the crew to bail out. The rear gunner’s seat aboard the Lancaster MkII was too small for the gunner actually to wear his parachute in flight, so he wore a special harness that his parachute could be clipped onto; he just had to leave the turret to go get it first. When Alkemade opened the door to the main cabin, he found it completely engulfed in flames, and everything inside was burning, including his parachute. 

Before the fire could engulf him, too, he quickly shut the turret gun door. He was more than three miles above the Earth, aboard a plane burning so hot it had melted his oxygen mask after just a few seconds of exposure. The fire was spreading, the plane was plummeting, and the airman was suddenly forced to choose between the flames and the dark void. 

He did a backflip out of the rear of the plane. 

A Tough Decision

“I had the choice of staying with the aircraft or jumping out,” Alkemade later said. “If I stayed, I would be burned to death — my clothes were already well alight and my face and hands burnt, though at the time I scarcely noticed the pain owing to my high state of excitement…

I decided to jump and end it as quickly and cleanly as possible. I rotated the turret to starboard and did a back flip out into the night, not even bothering to take off my helmet and intercom. It was quiet, the only sound being the drumming of aircraft engines in the distance, and there was no falling sensation. I felt suspended in space. Regrets at not getting home were my chief thoughts, and I did think once that it didn’t seem very strange to be going to die in a few seconds — none of the parade of my past or anything else like that.”

As the airman fell to Earth, the Werewolf exploded from somewhere above him. But that was no longer his chief concern. It wasn’t a concern at all. He had no more concerns. He fell to the ground at more than 120 miles per hour, almost fast enough to splatter like a water balloon upon hitting the ground. But Alkemade would never know because he passed out somewhere along the way. 

Barely Alive

Except Nicholas Alkemade didn’t split when he hit the ground. When he woke up just three hours later, he was in a calm pine forest covered in deep snow. Looking up at the night sky, the only clearing in the trees was the hole in the canopy made when his unconscious body came hurtling into the treeline from somewhere in the heavens above. He was burned from the aircraft and had some cuts, scrapes, and bruises, as well as a twisted knee. His flying boots had been ripped off his feet, but he was otherwise unharmed. He buried his harness and lit a cigarette.

The ground he landed on was protected from direct sunlight by the dense pine trees. As a result, there were 18 inches of snow on the ground there. Some 20 yards away, however, there was just hard ground; the snow had melted away by the daylight. He reckoned the pine branches slowed his fall enough as he went through the trees that the 18 inches of snow was more than enough to soften his landing. It was a springtime miracle. But it was still cold out, and Alkemade could not walk, so he blew a whistle to attract the attention of German civilians. 

Prisoner of War

He was captured, taken to a hospital for treatment, and eventually interrogated by the Gestapo. They were in disbelief when Alkemade told his captors he didn’t have a parachute. They accused him of being a spy. He challenged them to find his harness, which would show no evidence of having an attached chute deployed. It would show no evidence a parachute was ever even attached. When the Gestapo found the harness, it corroborated the story. They even found the Werewolf and what was left of Alkemade’s parachute. 

The Germans sent him to a hospital for three weeks before moving him to POW camp Stalag Luft III in Poland. He would be forced to march westward toward the end of the war to avoid being liberated by the advancing Red Army. Only three of the seven-man crew aboard the Werewolf survived the shootdown. The navigator, Sgt. John P. Cleary, and wireless operator Sgt. Geoffrey R. Burwell bailed out in time. 

Alkemade survived the war, left the Royal Air Force in 1946, and went to work at a chemical plant, where he cheated death via chlorine gas, sulphuric acid, and a nine-foot-long hunk of steel. He understandably quit that job and began a career selling furniture.