A Jumbo fifty years ago

It was fifty years ago, on November 6, 1929, that Chief Pilot Wilhelm Zimmermann of Junkers Flugzeugwerke AG (one of the old‐established companies since merged into MBB) took off in the G 38 for the first time, from the Dessau works airfield. With a span of 44m and a gross weight of 24,000 kg, it was the biggest land‐plane to have been built anywhere in the world up to that time. (By comparison, today's Airbus A300 has a span of just under 45m).