Agent drops from He 111

[TomJonas]

In 1940 the first Abwehr agents were dropped by parachute in England. The first to land by parachute was the swede Gosta Caroli, on Sept 6th 1940 near Northampton. He was arrested next day and soon recruited in the Double-Cross system under covername SUMMER. Soon his friend, the dane Schmidt followed. He was also caught and enrolled in the Double-Cross organization under covername TATE.

These agents were dropped from a converted black-painted He 111, flown from Brussels by the pilot Hauptman Karl Gartenfeld.

My question is: Does anyone know how the He 111 was converted and anything about these agent flights?
How did the agents drop?
Hardly from the ordinare hatches that were found on a He 111, it must have been some kind of opening in the belly.
Later on the H20 version was built for dropping several soldiers by parachute, but that was many years later.

[comiso90]

Welcome ... good question. I wonder if they were stripped of defensive armament and gunners for speed.

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[Airframes]

The belly hatch in the gondola of the He111 is amply big enough for parachute exits, even employing a static line. The Spanish CASA '111' s used in the BoB movie had been employed in the Spanish Air Force for parachute training, among other duties, without modification. I don't have any information on the particular aircraft used on the above operations, but the transport version would fit the bill, again without any extensive mods. The He111 currently in the RAF Museum, once 'owned' by the 56th FG, 8th USAAF, is actually a transport, and the interior fit is suited to para-dropping operations.
The task of para-dropping agents is slightly different from paratrooping, in as much as this type of operation would normally involve a single parachutist, or a very small group at most, when the interval between jumpers would not be as critical as despatching a stick of paras in the fastest possible time, in order to get that stick onto the DZ safely, without being spread out too far.

[solnar]

Originally Posted by Airframes

The belly hatch in the gondola of the He111 is amply big enough for parachute exits, even employing a static line. The Spanish CASA '111' s used in the BoB movie had been employed in the Spanish Air Force for parachute training, among other duties, without modification. I don't have any information on the particular aircraft used on the above operations, but the transport version would fit the bill, again without any extensive mods. The He111 currently in the RAF Museum, once 'owned' by the 56th FG, 8th USAAF, is actually a transport, and the interior fit is suited to para-dropping operations.
The task of para-dropping agents is slightly different from paratrooping, in as much as this type of operation would normally involve a single parachutist, or a very small group at most, when the interval between jumpers would not be as critical as despatching a stick of paras in the fastest possible time, in order to get that stick onto the DZ safely, without being spread out too far.

In the film, there are scenes where crews bailed out via the belly hatch.