“I signed up for Nováky. It was originally a collection camp, meaning a concentration camp for Jews. From there they were sent to Auschwitz. After the war in forty-five, German prisoners of war were there. Then they let the POWs go and it was us from the Technical Auxiliary Battalion. A three-meter high fence with barbed wire, every hundred meters or so a guard tower. Up above a spotlight and a guard with an automatic on the tower. During the war, when Jews had been there, it had been SS officers with a machine gun. Everyone thought we’d be in some barracks and then we wound up in a concentration camp. There were sixty-four of us to a room there.”
„Zpoza jednoho kopce se vynořilo letadlo. Letělo poměrně nízko. A začaly z něho padat tečky. To vyskakovali členové posádky. Nebyla to celá posádka, ale už asi jen polovina. Chvilku potom, co vyskočil poslední, letadlo ještě ve vzduchu explodovalo. Trosky potom dopadly do lesa za vesnici. Někde to hořelo, protože tam bylo asi dost benzinu, vybuchovala nevystřílená munice. Samozřejmě po válce jsem se s kamarádem na místo dopadu jednotlivých trosek vypravil. Nasbíral jsem celou velkou krabici různých drobností.“
„Toho dne se vypravilo čtyři sta šedesát jedna bombardérů na Ostravu a Bohumín. Byly to čtyřmotorové bombardéry. Každý motor měl dvanáct set koňských sil, takže jeden bombardér čtyři tisíc osm set koňských sil. Když si to vynásobíte tím počtem, tak to už bylo znát. Také nelétali v desetitisíci metrech a neměli proudové pohony, ale pístové motory, což také vydává určitý zvuk. Takže na zemi drnčely okenní tabulky a s námi to vibrovalo. Dneska by mi to nikdo neuvěřil, ale zažil jsem to na vlastní kůži. V domnění, že nás snad z té výšky uvidí, jsme jim mávali. I kdyby se dívali, z těch sedmi osmi tisíc metrů nás na té zemi vidět nemohli. Věděli jsme, že letí bombardovat a přáli jsme jim, aby se jim to povedlo. A domnívali jsme se, že když jsou tak vysoko, že Němci na ně nemohou, což ale bylo úplně jinak.“
Tomáš Pertile was born on 2 September 1933 in Ostrava to the family of a civil servant. His father died of tuberculosis in 1941, after which his mother fell seriously ill. During the years 1942-1944, he lived in an orphanage of Dominican nuns in Liptál na Vsetínsku. This is where, in1944, he witnessed the flight of hundreds of American bombers. He experienced the end of the war and liberation in Ostrava. His mother was a close co-worker of one of the founders of the Fight Against Tuberculosis, Bohumil Malý. He trained as a locksmith and a lathe operator. During his military service, he was called on to join the Technical Auxiliary Battalion (PTP). He worked in the warehouse of a building company in Ostrava. He completed his secondary school studies remotely and then he studied astronomy for two years in Valašské Meziříčí. From 1963 to 1972 he was the head of a public observatory in the center of Ostrava. In the nineties he worked for the newly built planetarium in Ostrava-Poruba. A planet was named after him for his popularization work concerning astronomy in 2004.
