Blohm & Voss BV 40

The Blohm & Voss BV 40 was a prototype armoured German glider that Blohm & Voss began designing in mid-1943 to attack Allied bomber formations in the Second World War. Richard Vogt, the firm's chief designer, planned for a single-engined fighter to tow it to high altitude, release it above the bombers' combat box, and let it dive and ram a bomber's tail. That ramming idea was dropped before the first flight in May 1944, and the glider was given cannon instead, with the pilot lying prone in an armoured cockpit. By April 1944 the fighter arm had lost interest, and work continued under the special operations unit KG 200 for attacks on invasion shipping with torpedo bombs. The prototypes proved much too heavy, so armour and one gun were removed for testing. The BV 40 made 17 flights and reached 470 kilometres per hour. The Luftwaffe cancelled it in August 1944 with only six of 21 ordered gliders completed, and all were destroyed in an air raid in October.