EXTREMELY RARE Luftwaffe nightfighter pilot's highly-secret coded interceptor chart.

This is the only example of one of these I have ever come across: a coded sector chart specifically for LW nightfighters, comprising an aerial chart/map divided into grids with codenames, subdivided into 9 smaller squares with numbers. As we know, the LW used daily changing codes and clearly this shows the codes and how they would easily be rotated. To vector a pilot to the correct location would be very simple and impossible for the enemy to know - then it would be up to the pilot and observer - using the Lichtenstein radar - to home in on the enemy aircraft. The chart measures 65cm x 42cm printed on mimeograph type paper. Very few survived — it was paramount to destroy them in the event of being shot down or captured. No one I have talked to has ever seen one of these code charts before — but it is what it is and the period photos show an example in actual use. Codes translate as follows: Bussard (Buzzard) = Einzelflieger (single pilot); kurier (courier) = small group; gross kurier = large group; Fahnlein (flag) = very large group. So they could be vectored as follows: "Kurier Otto Paula 6" to indicate small enemy force east of Bonn. The only other piece of information he would need is the altitude. Even if the message was intercepted, the Allies would have no clue that the nightfighter was onto them.  Note: photos of LW pilots studying a similar chart.

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