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Aviation History
1941
1941 - 0610.PDF
204 v"Tv/v ^ MARCH 13TH, 1941. IN THE AIR (Continued) LANDED IN PORTUGAL : The end of a Focke-Wulf Kurier shipping raider whose navigator's slide rule slipped. Spitfire had not even fired at it. Thesquadron to which the Spitfire belonged believed that it had destroyed five moreof the enemy and damaged another. On the day's work three of our fighters werelost, but the way was evidently opened for our bombers to reach Boulogne,where they scored hits on the docks and started a large fire in the inner harbour. Interesting things have also been hap-pening ;it nighr«s. The A.A, guns have been taking toll of the German raiders toan increasing extent, and our night fighters have also had some very grati-fying successes. In particular they have been visiting aerodromes in Fiance andwaiting for bombers to return from their raids on Britain. One night a Britishfighter pilot visited two different aero- drome? anil claimed a probable victimat each. At the first enemy aerodrome hevisited he found a machine about to land and gave it two full bursts from hisguns from very short range. Then, as he passed over the machine, he let goa stick of bombs from only 2vv f<et and saw them burst directly in the path ofthe enemy plane as it was taxying along the ground. " It must have receivedthe full force of the explosion," said the pilot. Guns around the aerodrome thencame into action and made it an un- healthy spot tn remain in, so the pilot:set off to find other prey. lie mnn found what he was looking for—another unsus-pecting German returning to his base. Again the pilot closed and poured a longburst from his front gun into his victim. The German turned sharply away, butin doing so gave the rear gunner a chance. He had time to get in two longbursts which appeared to go straight home. The enemy landed hurriedly andappeared to crash. Our night fighters over this countrywere active, too, on the same night, and damaged in combat a Ju. 88 and an He. m. Both machines appeared to bein such trouble that if it had been day- light our patrols would probably haveseen them crash. The pilot who came across the Heinkel stalked it until hewas only 30 yards away, and then let fly with all he had got. Just before thenight fighter lost contact with the Heinkel he saw a bright white flash comefrom it. It was a Squadron Leader who encountered the Ju. 88 and, from 200yards, saw his shots registering all along the fuselage. On another-night a pilot who carriedout an offensive patrol over an enemy bomber aerodrome during the night re-ports that he saw a German bomber pre- paring to land and immediately gavechase, following it round on its circuit and firing from close range. The grounddefences opened up against our fighter, but had to cease fire on a signal from theenemy plane, which was in danger of being shot down by German guns. Theenemy turned away but could not escape the fighter which closed in . to attack.During this attack the bomber was recognised as an He. in, and, afteranother burst from the British fighter, it fell away rapidly and was not seenagain. The fighter pilot's report says: "It is unlikely that this machine couldhave recovered from such a violent side- slip at that low altitude." German night-fighters have also beenmore active of late, and our bombers have fights with them every now andthen. One night a Biitish bomber over Cologne was first hit by h'lak and thenattacked by a German fighter. The bomber had successfully bombed itstarget on the first run; another run was then made and incendiaries startedsmall fires. As the bomber turned for home, a shell-burst damaged the star-board wing. The bomber went into a dive, but the captain managed to pull itout at about 6,000 feet. At this height the bomber was caught and held inmany searchlights, and because of the damage the pilot was unable to takemuch avoiding action. There was nothing for it but to come lower and fireat the searchlights. By this time about 40 searchlights were centred on the air-craft, so the rear-gunner decided to pick off those in the laigest groups. Heopened fire with short bursts and the beams went out, one after another. Now a new danger threatened. Whathad first appeared to be a particularly brilliant searchlight was recognised asthe beam of an enemy fighter's head- lights. At 200 yards the rear-gunr.ergave the enemy a preliminary burst. Hs then held the fighter in his sights andFopened fire, again. He kept up a con- tinuous fire, and, as he put it: "I sawmy bullets going straight into the enemy at about 30 yards." The enemy planeburst into flames and dived steeply. The observer in the front cockpit of thebomber caught sight of it and watched the flames. No reply had been madeby the enemy fighter and the rear- gunner who shot it down believes thatthe Ge-rman had intended to attack from above but had been caught by surprise.With the target bombed and the eneniv fighter disposed of, the bomber crew con-tinued home and landed safely- Of late the Coastal Command hae norhad much limelight on its proceedings, but its work goes on without inter-mission, and in the- winter it is more exacting than ever. Navigators of Sun-derland flying boats passed a severe test, with honours, when for three days tlievprovided escort to a damaged merchant vessel which had been disabled by enet"\"action and was drifting 300 miles w<M of the Shetlands in the worst Atlanticwinter weather. The crew of a Sunder- land received the position of the me-diant vessel and instructions to find he; Visibility at sea was never more tha::
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