New Evidence Points To Old Injury

Acknowledged as the greatest German ace of World War I, Baron Manfred von Richthofen died April 21, 1918 -- shot down by allied ground fire. But new research indicates it was the baron's bullheaded determination to fly that may have actually killed him.

Two American neuropsychologists, Thomas L. Hyatt and Daniel Orme, suggest von Richthofen's ability to fly was impaired nine months before his death when his skull was grazed by a bullet. The baron reportedly lost control of his arms and legs for a short time and was temporarily blind, after the bullet dug a four-inch gash in his head. Only at the last moment was he able to fly his Fokker into a crash landing. He collapsed immediately afterward.

"Using today's standards, he clearly should have been grounded," says Orme, a clinical associate professor at the University of Missouri at Columbia who used to evaluate pilots for the Air Force. "Perhaps the guy who shot him back in July of 1917 should get credit for the partial downing of the baron, setting the stage for his ultimate demise." Orme spoke in an interview with HealthDay.

Orme says the skull wound might have explained von Richthofen's increasingly strange and petulant behavior between the time he was wounded and his death months later.

The two scientists describe in their report for the periodical "Human Factors and Aerospace Safety." They likened the head wound to a "very severe concussion." They speculate that the baron's brain might have been bruised when he was wounded, leading to an injury of the frontal lobe.

If that was indeed the case, Orme said, "people do things they wouldn't normally do. They can be impulsive, have difficulty monitoring their own behavior, difficulty recognizing if what they're doing is appropriate."

In the weeks and months after he was wounded, von Richthofen changed. Friends -- even his mother -- noticed that he was "much more immature. He was moody and brooding," according to Orme.

Of course, how do you prove something like this? Dr. James Grisolia, a neurologist at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego, tells HealthDay you really can't. "The investigators' idea is plausible, but it's always hard to make definite judgments about historical figures when we can't examine them."

FMI: www.ashgate.com/subject_area/_aviation/aviation_journals.htm