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World War II: Of all the world wars, it’s definitely in the top three.
While World War II had a lot of fighting, there was very little seen in North America,
apart from one Pearl-Harbor-sized exception.
In fact, the lack of a German invasion in North America is one of the first facts I
learned about WWII in school, along other basics: Nazis bad, America good, Russia good
but then later bad, Churchill drunk but still good, etc, etc.
So you can imagine my surprise at discovering, when I delved into the topic mines for a fresh
new clickbaity title, that in fact, the Germans did invade North America, once, in 1943, for
28 hours, in a mission that was then forgotten about for over 30 years.
It was all centered around weather—you know, that app on your phone that says whether you
should wear a jacket today.
Back in World War II, cell service wasn’t good enough for smartphone based applications,
so if you wanted to know what the weather was going to be, you needed to have your own
weather predicting apparatus—and that was where the Germans had a problem.
You see, weather systems in the Northern hemisphere generally move from west to east, for a lot
of complicated reasons that I don’t have time to get into—something something Coriolis
effect.
I don’t understand the link between Toyota’s best-selling line of subcompact and compact
cars and weather patterns either but that’s what Google’s for.
The point is, if you want to know what the weather will be like in the Atlantic Ocean
and Europe in a few days, you have to look at what’s happening in North America now.
It’s like how if you want to know what memes will be trending on Instagram tomorrow, you
should look at Reddit today.
The Allies, because they controlled North America and most of the land around it, had
plenty of weather stations in North America, Iceland, and Greenland, which meant they could
predict what the weather would be like in Europe before the Germans could.
In the early stages of the war, the Germans got North American weather reports from secret
arctic stations, weather ships, weather aircraft, and U-boats with weather instrumentation,
but at this stage, their North American weather stations were easily captured by the Allies
because, you know, they were on Allied land and weather stations can’t run very fast.
The ships were also captured, and the aircraft were very limited in what they could collect
because every time they flew into the West Atlantic they risked being shot down.
Also, in order for the U-boats to transmit weather data they would have to break radio
silence, thus allowing them to be tracked, which really undermined the whole, “not
getting found,” part of being a U-boat.
But the Nazis really needed accurate weather data, because weather prediction is a super
important step in creating a pan-German racial state.
Tides affect where ships can land; storms affect where ships and aircraft can safely
travel; fog, rain, and clouds affect visibility; temperature affects what equipment and clothing
troops need; and so on.
In fact, D-Day was largely contingent on it being a day with low tide, minimal cloud cover,
light winds, and low seas, which would allow the allied troops to see, avoid, and disarm
the sea mines off the coast of Normandy.
So, the Germans designed a secret weather station, called the Wetter-Funkgerat Land.
While, “secret Nazi weather station,” sounds like the plot of a direct-to-video
History Channel movie, this was actually totally real.
These secret Nazi weather stations were then deployed in several key locations: 14 were
put in Arctic and sub-Arctic areas, 5 were placed around the Barents Sea, and two were
intended for North America.
However, only one of those two made it, as the submarine carrying the other was sunk
by a British air attack, which, you know… good.
It was a Nazi submarine, and sinking Nazi submarines is what you’re supposed to do.
The other station traveled in a U-boat, the U-537, which left for North America from Kiel,
Germany.
In order to keep it secret, the station was nicknamed, “Kurt,” which is kind of a
weird choice—codenames are usually something much cooler.
Like, imagine if instead of being called, “the Manhattan Project,” it was just called
“Steve.”
Doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Anyways, the U-Boat, carrying Kurt, was badly damaged on its journey by a storm—after
all, they didn’t know the weather yet—but despite a crack in its hull, and the loss
of its anti-aircraft cannons, the U-537 made land on October 22, 1943 at Martin Bay in
Northern Labrador—and while some of the crew stayed back to repair the sub, the rest
got to work installing Kurt.
Once they were done, they camouflaged it with empty American cigarette packages, and because
labeling it, “Secret Nazi Weather Station,” would have raised some eyebrows, they labeled
it as part of the, “Canadian Meteor Service,” which doesn’t exist.
Then, 28 hours after arriving, they left.
While the station was expected to work for six months, for unknown reasons, it stopped
transmitting after one.
Which, again, you know, is good—Nazis are bad.
Perhaps the strangest element of this story, though, is the entire thing was forgotten
for over thirty years.
Until 1977, Weather Station Kurt just sat there, unnoticed, until a geomorphologist—basically
a landscape scientist—named Peter Johnson found it while working on an unrelated project.
Because it was labeled as part of the, “Canadian Meteor Service,” he didn’t think much
of it, but later, a retired engineer for the German engineering firm Siemens, who had originally
built the station, found Johnsons’ notes, connected the dots, and got in touch with
the Canadians, who pulled an Indiana Jones and decided that it belongs in a museum—specifically,
the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, where it still sits today.
To this day, this remains as one of the only times where Nazi soldiers made landfall in
North America.
If you don’t have time to go all the way to Ottawa to see Kurt, I’ve got a great
way that you can still learn a ton about World War II: Curiosity Stream.
It’s a documentary streaming site with thousands of top-quality films, including literally
dozens on World War II, and right now, during their special holiday sale, you can get access
for an entire year for only $11.99.
I just want to let that sink in: an entire year of access for $11.99.
That’s less than the cost of a chicken parm at Olive Garden: except instead of having
an upset stomach, you get a year of access to incredible documentary films, plus that’ll
also include access to Nebula—the streaming site started by myself and a bunch of other
creators and has loads of great original content.
On Nebula, you’ll even find the documentary that I filmed on the tiny, remote, south-Atlantic
island of St Helena.
You can sign up for Curiosity Stream with this special pricing, and get access to Nebula
included, at CuriosityStream.com/HAI.