page_title: Operation Gearbox
section_title: 15–29 July
hierarchical_section_title: Operation Gearbox / Operation Gearbox / 15–29 July
caption_attribution_description: Norsk bokmål: Panorama over Longyearbyen og Adventfjorden
context_page_description: Operation Gearbox was a Norwegian and British operation on the Arctic island of Spitzbergen in the Svalbard Archipelago, during the Second World War. Operation Fritham, an earlier expedition in two ships, arrived on 13 May but met disaster after being spotted by a Luftwaffe Ju 88 bomber. Next day, four Fw 200 reconnaissance bombers attacked and killed fourteen men, including Einar Sverdrup, the commander. Eleven men were wounded, two mortally, one ship was sunk and the other set on fire.
  The survivors salvaged what equipment they could and set up camp in Barentsburg, which had been deserted since Operation Gauntlet and sent out reconnaissance parties. The Admiralty arranged a reconnaissance flight by a RAF Coastal Command Catalina flying boat but already knew much of what had happened, through Ultra decrypts of Luftwaffe Enigma coded wireless signals. Operation Gearbox, 57 Norwegians with 116 long tons of supplies arrived by cruiser on 2 July, to supersede Operation Fritham.
  The reinforcements consolidated the Barentsburg defences and sent parties to attack the German weather party at Longyearbyen on 12 July, only to find that they had departed three days earlier.
context_section_description: Once the Colt parts had been delivered, Ullring had one mounted in a cutter and on 15 July, set off in the midnight sun with ten men, to attack the Germans at Longyearbyen in Advent Bay. The last Germans on Spitzbergen, including the weather-reporting party that had been in residence since late 1941, had been flown back to Norway on 9 July. The Germans had gone but the Ju 88 shot up on 1 July was still there, the wireless transmitter and other equipment were operational, stores were plentiful and the buildings used by the party were in good condition, suggesting that the German departure was not permanent. The Krote near the shore at Hjorthamn was found, dismantled and returned to Barentsburg for shipment to Britain and a party with two Colt and two Browning machine-gunswas left behind to guard the airstrip. A Ju 88 was sent from Norway to investigate the cessation of transmissions from the Krote on 20 July; the crew saw that the base had been destroyed and found themselves under machine-gun fire from the Norwegians. The party at Sveagruva heard the bomber pass overhead and assumed that the base at Banak had been alerted.
  On 21 July, a Ju 88 flying over Green Harbour was fired on by the Oerlikon gunners; the port engine trailed smoke and a hole appeared in one of the wing tips. German records showed that the crew judged the landing ground was too boggy for safe landings in the summer. As a precaution against a surprise landing, the ground markers were removed by the Norwegians, several trenches were dug and obstacles were strewn over the strip. Another transmitter and some stores were found in Adventdalen; Ullring sailed south to Bellsund (Bell Sound), Van Mijenfjorden (Lowe Sound) and Braganza Bay to deliver arms to the Fritham Force party and take nine of them to reinforce Barentsburg. At Banak, Dr Erich Etienne, who had supervised the weather data operation and Major Vollrath Wibel arranged a reconnaissance flight to Spitzbergen. A Ju 88 of Wetterkundungsstaffel 5 (Weather Squadron 5) flew the sortie over Advent Bay on 23 July to reconnoitre the extent of the Allied interference with the Krote. As the aircraft flew low towards Hjorthamn and made a steep turn, Niks Langbak a Selis gunner, fired ten rounds from a Colt machine-gun and the bomber crashed and exploded; two rounds had hit one of the engines. The area around Hiorthfjellet had several coal transporter cables and the Ju 88 might have collided with one after being hit; the crew were buried and code books salvaged from the wreckage.
caption: Panorama of Longyearbyen from Advent Fjord (2008)
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