AUDACIOUS FEAT.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 60, Issue 45, 2 December 1939, Page 5

AUDACIOUS FEAT.

THE AIR RAID ON BORKQM.

FIRST TIME UNDER GUN-FIRE.’

LONDON, November 30

The raid on the German base ias Borkum Island qh'“Tuesday' by the Royal Air Force is declared by.-reports to have been one of the most audacious raids in the history of war flying. The German communique, which ungrudgingly described tlio raid as a daring exploit, admits that it caught the base unawares. The full story of the raid, now being pieced together,’' "dops not bear -out 4lie German clainv that no .which carried out the raid landed safely in “'darkness on its home aerodrome. They returned, as they went, a complete squadron of 12 twin-engined fighters’,' 1 piloted by six Royal Air Force regulars and six members of the Auxiliary Air Force: - > . Not one of the pilots or any other members, of the crews had been under gun-fire before. They covered 500 miles in carrying out a highly-success-ful attack on a fortified seaplane base and, in spite of intense a'nti-aircraft fire, no member of the crews—36 men —sustained a scratch, and not a single aircraft bore any trace of the gunfire to which it had been subjected. The patrol was sent out to reconnoitre the German base and attack the seaplanes in the air or at their base. It emerged from cloud after flying through a rainstorm at a short distance from its targets. Before the main attack the pilots spotted five seaplanes on the slipways, together with coastal patrol boats. The patrol was flying in four sections of three aircraft each, and they immediately dived foi their various objectives, spraying machine gun bullets from heights of sometimes below 100 • feet. One of the fighters skimmed through a gap in the mole.

The Germans were taken completely by surprise. The fighter crews could see men running in all directions, while some gunners occupying a post on top of a hangar fell to the ground. For a while there was pandemonium. Then anti-aircraft guns and the coastal patrol boats got into action, but the standard of firing was not very high. Undisturbed by the enemy’s pompoms and machine-guns, the British fighters pressed home their low flying attacks. As one member of the crew said afterwards: “The Germans probably never thought they wduM have to hit anything so low in the air.” y'

Their tasbj over, the - fighters , formed and flew back to England, 200 miles of the. .journey being covered in darkness. They were not intercepted by German .aircraft during‘aiiy period of thq flight.—British Official Wireless.

GERMAN SEAPLANE DOWNED.

ACTION OVER, NORTH SEA

LONDON, November 30. The Air Ministry announced : “While on. patrol over the North Sea yesterday two British aircraft overtook and shot down a German-Dernier-seaplane. The crew of the Dernier were picked up by a Nonyegian' 'sliip.—British Official Wireless. -