Ulf Ewert
On April 12, 2024, our club colleague Ulf Ewert died at the age of 83 after a short, serious illness. We are very saddened by his death because Ulf was in the middle of our club’s events just a few weeks earlier. He was in the workshop throughout the whole winter – as he does every year – before the energy left him. Now he has taken off on his last flight.
The Osnabrueck Aviation Association (OVfL) mourns the loss of a highly active club mate, who was also active on the board for many years as technical director and second chairman and who helped steer the club’s fortunes for decades. Ulf Ewert was born on February 4, 1941 in Klein Rauschen, Lyck district, in the Masurian Lake District. The family had to flee under the most difficult conditions and ultimately came to the Osnabrueck region, where Ulf found a new home in Achmer and his wife Elke. He completed an apprenticeship as a machine fitter and later became a mechanical engineering technician. On May 1, 1956, he joined the OVfL at the Achmer airfield as a 15-year-old boy, did his first jumps on the SG 38 and then trained on the Rhönlerche. In 1970 he became a flight instructor and from then on it was almost impossible to imagine the airfield without him. We will feel this in the next few weeks and months because Ulf was such a constant member – until the end. In him we are losing a humble person, which was always very helpful. The interests of the club were central to him. He was a glider pilot with great passion. And of course his life would only be incompletely described if one didn’t talk about vintage aviation; In the 1970s and 1980s he flew cross-country in terms of performance – preferably with the Mosquito. But from the mid-1980s onwards his passion for wooden aircraft awoke – not only the Foka 4 (D-6373) was the focus; but also the various construction projects in the OVfL – from the Lo 100 to the two Grunau Babies, the Olympia Meise and the Kranich III. Wherever chips fell, Ulf was there. That’s how it happened through Dr. Harald Kämper to contact the Vintage Glider Club. Ulf hardly missed a VGC rally and traveled through Europe with his Foka 4 and caravan; and when he could no longer do that, he only did so by car. In this way, last summer he was right in the middle of the big VGC family in Aston Down. There is still a lot to mention here – the organization of the VGC rallies in Achmer in 2002 and 2009 and of course the Grunau Baby meetings, which took place alternately at the original location in Grunau in Poland. Ulf was always the organizer and motivator of the trips to Poland, and also one of the driving forces for all the other meetings of Grunau Baby fans. The polish pilots honored him in 2018 with a bronze plaque on the historic hall in Grunau – it hangs between Gottlob Espenlaub and Wolf Hirth. We in the Osnabrueck region and at the Achmer airfield will also honor his memory.
Joachim Jeska, Chairman of the OVfL e.V.