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The German Air-Sea Rescue Service

Prompted by an incident in the winter of 1934 (two fishing trawlers in the North Sea collided and sank, the survivors were found by a Luftwaffe He-59 which could not land in the high seas and the crew could only watch as the survivors drowned or died from hypothermia), the German Air-Sea Rescue Service was created in the late summer of 1934. An explicitly civilian service, the Service is charged with the rescue and succor of anyone in danger on the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. Its aircraft (in 1934, 5 re-badged and re-equipped ex-Luftwaffe Heinkel He-59s, beginning in spring 1935 30 purpose-built Dornier Do-24As) are equipped to drop supply-equipped self-inflating rafts to persons in distress, and the pilots are trained in not only dropping rafts but in bad weather flying, landings, and rescues. The aircraft are painted a bright yellow, for easy visibility from the sea or from the air, and equipped with additional lights and observation locations to allow them to be seen easily and to help their odds of seeing their "quarry". Inside, the Do-24s have space for rescued personnel and a flight medic is carried as well to try to treat the worst injuries.

A typical mission for an aircraft of the Service is a flight to the north-central section of the North Sea from their base at Cuxhaven, followed by hours of slow flight in a large figure-8 waiting to see if an SOS signal is received, then a flight back to Cuxhaven. Most often, 2 aircraft will be on station at any one time, to allow for mechanical failures, to assist in rescuing any persons in need, and to allow one plane to remain at the site of an accident to help other rescue units find the site of the accident.