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Aviation History
1944
1944 - 2133.PDF
OCTOBER 19TH, 1944 f WAR IN THE AIR __^ . = i, tunity, but need to be supported in good time by regular ground forces. The fight to clear the passage of the Scheldt up to Antwerp dragged on for a long time. How far the flooding of Walcheren put the German batteries on the island out of action is not clear at the moment of writing. One report said that they were mostly located on higher ground and so were not sub merged by the flood. In that case it would be an easy matter to keep them supplied with ammunition and the men with food and water. Certainty some emplacements at Breskens, on the mainland, continued to harass the. waterway opposite Flushing on the island. Lancasters were sent out in daylight last week, with fighter escort, to bomb those emplacements. The aircrews reported a good concen tration of bombing; but at the moment of writing it is not publicly known whether all the guns have been put out of action. On the Eastern Front one hears of Czechoslovak airmen flying Russian aircraft operating from bases in cap tured Slovakia in support of the patriot forces. Their intervention is reported to have been decisive. The Tempest COME facts about the Hawker Tem- ^ pest single-seater fighter have recently been made public. As the. GERMAN JETS : (Above) A single- jet Me 163 taking off from the airfield at Zwischenahn. It is practically an all-wing aircraft. (Right) Me 262 twin-jet aircraft lined up on the run way at Lechfeld, in Bavaria. Note the twin-jet scorch marks. Hawker Typhoon first made its name by defeating the tip-and-run raids on the South Coast, so the Tempest first came into prominence through its suc cesses against the air torpedo, of which it shot down nearly 600. But these machines had been in action over France before D-day, and had destroye"d or damaged over 100 loco motives. THE WIND GOETH WHERE IT LISTETH : A Hawker W. Humble, one of the senior Hawker test pilots, transferred from A.D.G.B. to 2nd T.A.F. and are already airfieNs /i st in the hands of empests have been ,g from Continental In appearance the Tempest is rather like the Typhoon, but has eliptical" wings resembling those of the Spitfire, and a high tail fin. Pilots say that it is extremely easy to fly. German fighters are not very often met nowadays, but the Tempest has proved its ability to turn inside a Fw. 190 and keep on its tail. It is very manoeuvrable and makes a re markably steady gun platform. It was used against the air torpedoes by night as well as by day. As the fortunes of the German Army steadily sink so the intensity of the Allied bombing campaign rises to a pitch of intensity never before attained. Last week the R.A.F. in attacks by day and night dropped 10,000 tons of bombs on the inland port of Duisburg, leaving the city a mass of flames. At the week-end the U.S. 8th Air Force sent 1,200 heavy bombers on two successive -days to attack Cologne, where presumably re pairs had been making some progress. Last Sunday Lancasters scored direct hits with 12,000 lb. bombs on the Sorpe dam, the third Ruhr water barrage south-east of Dortmund. British parachute troops landed near Athens and were joined by other British forces which must have marched up from Patras. Corinth had been previously occupied. The Ger mans in Greece are not concerned with resisting the Allies, but with trying to escape from the country before they get cut off in the north by the advance of the Russians and the forces of Mar shal Tito. No small country had resisted the Axis more gallantly than Greece did, and none suffered more cruelly from enemy occupation and spoliation. All right-minded people feel a special jubilation at the libera tion of Greece from its trials. All Greeks, and especially all Greek child ren, will soon, we hope, have enough nourishing food.
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